
Book 



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ORIGIN AND HISTORY 



OF THE 



BOOKS OF THE BIBLE, 



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DESIGNED TO SHOW 



WHAT THE BIBLE IS NOT, WHAT IT IS, AND HOW TO USE IT 



By PROF 



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(THE NEW TESTAMENT,) 

ILLUSTRATED 



PUBLISHED BY SUBSCRIPTION ONLY, BY 

HARTFORD PUBLISHING COMPANY, 

HARTFORD, CONN. 

J. D. DENISON, NEW YORK. 
ZEIGLER, McCURDY & CO., PHILADELPHIA, PA. ; CINCINNATI, O. : 
AND ST. LOUIS, MO. J. A. STODDARD, CHICAGO, ILL. 
1868. 



■£foTi"VbO 



Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1867, by 

CALVIN E. STOWE, 

in the Clerk's office of the District Court of the United States, for 
District of Connecticut. 

Entered also at 
Stationers' Hall, London. England. 



Transfer 
Engineers School Lifig^ 
June 28,1331 



TO THOSE WHO WITH ME 



THE FOLLOWING PAGES 



AKE AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED 



% tbs iJtattawt. 



ILLUSTRATIONS. 



Portrait of the Author, - 
Jerusalem from Mount of Ol'ivfs, 
Convent of St. Catharine, Mount Sinai, 

C^ESAREA, - 

Mount of Olives, - 

View Of Bethlehem, - 

Cave of Nativity, - 

Vale and City of Nazareth, - 

Bethany, - 

Lake of Tiberias, - 

Jews' Place of Wailing, - 

The Holy Sepulchre, - 

Island of Patmos, - 

Nine Fac-simile Illustrations of Ancient Manuscripts, let- 
tered A, B, C, D, E, F, F, G, H, with their explanations, are in- 
serted at the close of the third chapter. 



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PREFACE. 



The purpose of this volume can best be shown by a familiar illus- 
tration : I purchase several different parcels of real estate in the 
city of Hartford, and wish to ascertain the validity of my title to 
each one of the parcels. I take the deeds to the register's office and 
there trace each one by itself through all the preceding purchasers 
till I come to the title derived from the original proprietors. If there 
is no break in this chain of documentary evidence the title is perfect. 

So each one of the books of the New Testament must be traced 
up to the Apostles, who only had authority to deliver inspired books 
to the churches. This is what the present volume professes to do. It 
is a book of authorities and testimonies ; it is the tracing and verify- 
ing of title deeds. 

But there are some deeds in which the chain is broken before we 
get to the original proprietors ; there are some which are forgeries 
and were not given by the men whose names they bear ; and there 
are others which were given by the persons whose names they bear, 
but these persons had no authority to make the sales. All such deeds 
are invalid and confer no title. 

These latter deeds represent the apocryphal books. It is proposed 
to show that every one of the apocryphal books belongs to one of these 
three classes, to wit: 1. They can not be traced to the apostles ; 2. 
Some of them are proved to be forgeries ; 3. And others, though gen- 
uine, were written by persons who had not apostolic authority to give 
inspired books to the churches. 

In making our investigations we begin with the times of Jerome 
and Augustin ; because all admit that since that period there have 
been no changes in the canon, and no authority for any change. 
■ Thus each individual book of the New Testament is shown to 
stand on its own merits, its own evidence ; and there is a full ex- 
posure of the groundlessness of the silly story so often repeated, that 
certain men got together and voted what should be Bible, and what 
should not, and that this is the authority on which we receive the 
books of the Bible as of Divine origin. 

This being a book of authorities and testimonies, as has 
already been said, it must necessarily be, to a considerable extent, 
made up of extracts from the original authors and witnesses. The 
works from which these extracts are made, are not accessible to the 



VI PREFACE. 

people, or even to the ministers of the church, except in very few 
cases, and therefore there is an absolute necessity for giving the ex- 
tracts quite fully, if we would afford to our readers a fair opportunity 
of making up their own judgment on sufficient grounds. To scholars 
by profession I recommend the voluminous works of the Church 
Fathers themselves, and the very copious and judicious selections from 
them made in the large and elaborate treatises by Lardner and Kirch- 
hofer. I have faithfully endeavored to give a fair specimen of the 
testimony. To give the whole of it and the arguments arising from 
it, w T ould be to make ten volumes like Lardner instead of one, and 
place the work entirely beyond the reach of those for whom I intend 
it. I have not given the strongest testimonies only, but fair speci- 
mens of both the strongest and the weakest ; that the reader may 
see exactly how the matter lies in the original authorities to which I 
appeal. 

The extracts from the apocryphal books are also full and copious ; 
for these books for the most part are wholly inaccessible to the public 
generally, and without full extracts I should entirely fail of my object, 
which is to put into the hands of the common reader ample means 
of judging between the canonical and the apocryphal. Some of these 
books are exceedingly interesting. They are the honest endeavors 
of good Christian men, near the apostolic times ; and the manifest 
difference between the apostolic writings and theirs, is just the differ- 
ence between divine inspiration and the unassisted efforts of the hu- 
man mind at that period and in that class of people. Others of these 
books are mere fictions, contrived by men more remote from the 
apostolic period, who had withdrawn into caves and deserts, and who 
thought that the way to serve God was to have nothing to do with 
men. Their dreams and sleepy imaginings are just what we might 
expect under such circumstances ; but how different from the practi- 
cal common sense and energetic worldly activity of the New Testa- 
ment ! 

The style of my book is plain, simple and colloquial, as the purpose 
in writing it required. I hope it is neither barbarous nor un-grammat- 
ical ; for though I make no claims to elegance, I have endeavored to 
be correct, concise and intelligible. 

A similar volume, of about the same size, on the Old Testament, 
including discussions of some general topics, necessary to a complete 
view of the whole subject, such as Inspiration, Miracles, the Laws 
of Interpretation, etc., will be ready early next spring, if Providence 
permit. 

C. E. STOWE. 

April 1, 1867. 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER I. 

The common popular objections to the Bible at 

the present day what the blble is not, what 

it is, and how to use it, - - - 9-37 

CHAPTER II. 

The kind of evidence on which we receive the 

sacred books of the new testament, - - 39-56 

CHAPTER III. 

Evidence on which we receive the present text of 
the New Testament as substantially correct. 
Description of the Ancient Manuscripts of the 
New Testament, with Fac-simile Illustrations, - 57-100 

CHAPTER IY. 

Brief Biographies of one hundred of the Ancient 
Witnesses to the New Testament books, whose 
testimony is most important, and much of it cited 

IN THIS WORK, - - - - 101-140 

CHAPTER V. 

Testimony for the historical books of the New 

Testament, ------ 141-160 

CHAPTER VI 

The four Gospels separately examined, Matthew, 

Mark, Luke and John, - - - _ 161-201 



Vlll CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER VIL 
The Apocryphal Gospels and fragments of Gos- 
pels supposed to be lost, - 203-252 

CHAPTER VIII. 

Modern substitutes for the Gospel History — exam- 
ination of the Biographies of Jesus, by Strauss, 
Weisse, Gfroerer, Bruno Bauer, F. C. Baur, Re- 
nan and Schenkel, ----- 253-312 

CHAPTER IX. 

The Acts of the Apostles* and the Apocryphal 

Acts, ------- 313-334 

CHAPTER X. 

The Fourteen Epistles of Paul, - 335-389 

CHAPTER XL 

The Catholic Epistles and the Apocryphal Epis- 
tles, ------- 391-467 

CHAPTER XII. 

The Revelaton of St. John and the Apocryphal 

Revelations, - - - - 469-508 

CHAPTER XIII.. 

The Bible Prophets and the Classical Oracles 

CONTRASTED, ------ 509-540 

CHAPTER XIY. 

The Apocryphal Books of the Old Testament and 

the reasons for their exclusion from the canon, 541-583 



CHAPTER FIRST. 

THE COMMON POPULAR OBJECTIONS TO THE BIBLE AT THE 
PRESENT DAY. WHAT THE BIBLE IS NOT, WHAT IT IS, 

AND HOW TO USE IT. 

John, v. 39 ; xvii. 17, — Search the Scriptures. Thy Word is truth. 

The Lord Jesus, when talking with the unbelieving 
Jews, says to them, Search the Scriptures, and when 
praying to his Heavenly Father, in behalf of his disci- 
ples, he says, Sanctify them through thy truth, thy 
word is truth. 

According to these two statements, the Lord Jesus 
must have considered the Scriptures to be the very 
best book in the world, both for believers and unbeliev- 
ers, both for the regenerate and the unregenerate ; he 
must have regarded them as true ; he must have looked 
upon the Bible as it then existed, and was afterwards 
to be enlarged, as the best means of making men good 
and noble and true ; and he must have thought, that 
in order to derive benefit from it, men must search, 
examine, and study it. 

Many persons in our day seem to have quite a differ- 
ent opinion of the Bible from that which the Lord 
Jesus here expresses. A respectable old book enough 
(they think) considering. the times in which its differ- 
ent parts were written, but far behind the civilization 
of the present day, and it has, on the whole, about as 



10 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 



many bad things in it as good ones. Without showing 
any disrespect to these men we may be permitted to 
say, so far as personal character is concerned, intel- 
lectual or moral, or so far as opportunity of knowledge 
on this subject is concerned, their mere opinion in re- 
gard to the Bible can not be considered, to say the 
very least, any more worthy of our regard than that 
of the Lord Jesus. 

Let us bring this matter to the test of fact and com- 
mon sense. These men say, that the Bible is no more 
inspired than the writings of Homer and Shakespeare, 
and other great men, whom God has fitted to be the 
instructors of mankind. Well, then, let us try and 
see. Let us for a while use Homer and Shakespeare 
instead of the Bible, say night and morning, in our 
family prayers — when we meet in the house of God 
for his worship — in the hour of sickness and calamity 
and distress — at funerals, when all our earthly hopes 
are blighted, and we lay our dearest friends in the 
grave — let us- then, instead of reading the Bible, 
take a few passages from Homer and Shakespeare. 
How long do you think this would last, before we 
should be glad to get back to our Bible again ? 

The old gross assaults on the Bible, of the Voltaire 
and Paine school have now generally passed by, the 
book is treated rather respectfully than otherwise by 
its opponents, and the objections to it are founded 
mainly on what it is not and what it does not profess 
to be, rather than on what it is and what it does pro- 
fess to be. And these objections for the most part are 
entirely inappropriate, wholly aside from all the facts 
of the Bible, and from all the claims which it makes 



WHAT THE BIBLE IS NOT. 11 

for itself. They are just like objecting to a ship 
because it is not adapted to moving on a railway, or 
to a locomotive because it can not sail on the sea; 
like objecting to an iron foundry because it will not 
make cloth, or to a cotton factory because it can 
not manufacture iron. To meet such objections we 
must consider what the Bible is not as well as what 
it is, what it does not claim to be, as well as what it 
does claim to be. 

I. The Bible is not an amulet, a charm, a fetish, a 
thing which by its mere presence without any voluntary 
agency exerted in connection with it, accomplishes its 
purpose ; it is not to be used as the believers in witchcraft 
use a horse-shoe, or the American Indian his medicine- 
bag, or the superstitious Christian his relic or crucifix. 

The Bible is not, neither does it claim to be, any- 
thing of this kind. It is the principles of the Bible 
which must be brought into contact with the soul, 
which must be interwoven with the very texture of 
our minds, which must be made a part of our moral 
nature. This is the way and the only way in which it 
promises to benefit us, in wmich it has done any good; 
and it does not operate by its mere presence like a 
charm or relic. 

The thirsty man in the desert, when he comes to a 
spring, must drink of it as well as find it, or he per- 
ishes with thirst. 

Yet men sometimes say, The Bible does no good ; 
here it has been in the world thousands of years ; and 
the world is still full of sin and misery, just as it 
always has been. 

In the midst of Christian churches where the Bible 



12 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

is read every day, there are the dishonest, the licen- 
tious, the blood-thirsty, and the villainous. True, but 
are these dishonest, licentious, blood-thirsty, villainous 
people, in Christian communities, the men who love 
and read the Bible — or the reverse ? Which are the 
families generally that rear the industrious, frugal, 
intelligent, useful citizens ; the families that despise and 
neglect the Bible, or the families that revere and study 
it? Are the men generally who neither believe nor 
love the Bible, who neither regard nor study it, better 
men than their neighbors, who believe, love and obey 
the Bible ? Is the Bible generally a favorite book in 
grog-shops and gambling houses and brothels ? Is it 
a book which cheats and swindlers and rogues espe- 
cially love to study ? 

Let us look at this matter in the light of common 
honesty and common sense. A plague is raging in a 
city, and a benevolent physician discovers a remedy, 
which, if taken according to the prescription, infalli- 
bly cures ; all who take it and follow the prescriptions 
escape death from the plague. But some refuse to 
take the medicine ; others take it and do not follow 
the prescriptions, and these sicken and die. Now, 
says the objector, see, that medicine does no good — 
people die of the plague just as they did before ! 
True, but who die ? they who take the remedy, or they 
who refuse or neglect it ? There is the test as you 
well know. Now try the Bible by that test and your 
objection is answered. Contrast any nation, any peo- 
ple, any community, that has and reverences and uses 
the Bible, with any nation, people or community that 
has it not, or refuses to put it to its proper use, and 



WHAT THE BIBLE IS NOT. 13 

see the difference. However prejudiced you may be, 
you can not shut your eyes to the plainest of facts. 

II. The Bible is not one unbroken chain of books, 
chapters, and verses, representing one unbroken series 
of divine utterances from beginning to end. 

Look for no such thing as this when reading the 
Bible, but rather the contrary. The Scriptures were 
given to men piecemeal, throughout many ages, as 
God saw the right opportunities — at sundry times and 
in divers manners — this is what the Bible says of itself; 
and not all at once, as if you must have bud, blossom and 
fruit, all in the same hour. The analogy here between na- 
ture and the word, as in everything else, holds perfectly. 
First the blade, then the ear, and after that the full corn 
in the ear ; this is what the Bible says of itself, and 
this is just what we find it to be. There is but little 
of external unity in the Bible, it makes no pretensions 
to any such thing ; you need not be at all shaken by 
the clamors of those who would make this obvious 
fact an objection to the authority of the Scriptures. 
As well might it be objected to the miracles of Christ 
that they are not given in philosophical order, begin- 
ning with the less and going on to the greater, with 
just so many and only so many of each kind. 

The unity of Scripture is not an external, it is an 
internal, a spiritual unity, the unity of one grand idea 
running through the whole, the idea of reuniting the 
human soul to God, from whom it has been so sadly 
broken off by sin ; and that too through a long con- 
tinued process of sharp conflict and agonizing struggle. 

Outside, .the Bible is like some of those grand old 
rural dwellings in England, a congeries of different 



14 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

buildings in every variety of style, the disconnected 
work of many successive generations ; but within, a 
perfect harmony of utility and convenience, and all 
proceeding on one idea. 

Warwick Castle, for example, viewed from the out- 
side, is an immense pile, the disjointed work of four 
or five successive centuries, with every variety of 
architecture ; but within, the apartments, though each 
is finished in the style appropriate to its own period, 
are most nicely adjusted to each other, so as to form 
suits of rooms perfectly harmonious, and make the 
whole edifice a convenient and delightful residence. 
So with the Scriptures, externally a miscellany, or if 
you please to call it so, a jumble, of different composi- 
tions, in different styles, by all sorts of authors, and 
separated by ages and centuries, yet internally, spirit- 
ually, a perfectly harmonious whole. So strong is this 
internal oneness, that it is even seen on the outside. 
1 In the first three chapters of Genesis we have creation, 
paradise, and the apostacy ; then through all the suc- 
ceeding books, conflict unspeakable, a protracted, 
dreadful struggle, till in the last three chapters of 
Revelations, we have the new creation, paradise 
regained, the final eternal victory over sin and Satan, 
and every form of evil.'* 

It is no objection to the Bible, considering the uses 
it was designed to subserve, that it is made up, as the 
objectors say, of the fragments of Hebrew literature 
throughout many ages, or even that of some of the 
books the authors names are not certainly known ; — ■ 
any more than it is an objection to Warwick Castle, 
* Archbishop Trench. 



WHAT THE BIBLE IS NOT. 15 

that it was not built at one time, by one architect, and 
in one uniform style of architecture ; or that the names 
of the different architects of the different portions of 
it have not all been preserved. The very interest and 
beauty of the edifice is greatly heightened by this 
diversity, as every one sees and feels ; and the name 
of an architect has no essential connection with the 
perfection of his work ; that stands on its own founda- 
tion, name or no name. All this is literally true of 
the Bible ; it is vastly more interesting, more beauti- 
ful, more adapted to the use of mankind, as it is, than 
it could be if it had been one compact, uniform treat- 
ise ; and the book of Job is just as interesting a book 
as it would have been if it were certainly known 
whether the name of the author should be written 
with two or three syllables instead of one, whether we 
should call him Job, or Moses, or Elihu. When we 
have a statute book issued by the authority of our 
government, we do not need to have the name of each 
one of the original engrossing clerks signed to each 
individual enactment, to give it authority ; enough that 
the whole book, as it stands before us, has been prop- 
erly authenticated ; and this we claim has been done 
in respect to the Bible. 

III. The Bible is not given to us in any celestial 
or superhuman language. If it had been it would 
have been of no use to us, for every book intended 
for men must be given to them in the language of 
men. But every human language is of necessity, and 
from the very nature of the case, an imperfect lan- 
guage. No human Imguage has exactly one word 
and only one for each distinct idea. In every known 



16 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

language the same word is used to indicate different 
things, and different words are used to indicate the 
same thing. In every human language each word has 
more than one meaning, and each thing has generally 
more than one name. 

The boy is learning his letters — the merchant is 
writing his letters — Dr. Johnson was a man of letters. 
In these three sentences the same word letters is used 
to designate three perfectly distinct and most widely 
divergent things — yet nobody mistakes, or nobody 
need mistake, for the connection in each case shows 
the meaning. How many different names there are to 
designate that one thing, a boat. In every known 
language words are sometimes used in a figurative 
sense and not always in their literal signification. In 
the first stanza of Grey's .Ode on Spring, there are no 
less than eight words used in their figurative instead 
of their literal sense. Yet who mistakes ? 

u Lo, where the rosy-bosomed Hours 

Fair Venus' train appear, 
Disclose the long-expecting flowers 

And wake the purple year ! 
The Attic warbler pours her throat 
Responsive to the cuckoo's note, 
The untaught harmony of Spring : 
While, whispering pleasure as they fly, 
Cool zephyrs through the clear blue sky 

Their gather'd fragrance fling." 

In all these cases men can mistake if they choose. 
They can make the metaphorical literal, and the literal 
metaphorical, they can confound the equivocal, and 
confuse the synonymous, if they will be perverse and 
unfair ; and they can understand aright if they desire 



WHAT THE BIBLE IS NOT. 17 

to. All this is as true of the Bible as of any other 
book, and no more so. 

Moreover, human minds are unlike in the impres- 
sions which they receive from the same word ; and it 
is certain that one man seldom gives to another, of 
different temperament, education, and habits of thought, 
by language, exactly the same idea, with the same 
shape and color, as that which lies in his own mind ; 
yet, if men are honest and right-minded they can come 
near enough to each other's meaning for all purposes 
of practical utility. 

Here comes in the objection that the Bible can be 
made to mean everything and anything, all sects build 
upon it, the. most diverse doctrines are derived from it 

This infelicity it shares with everything else that has 
to be expressed in human language. This is owing to 
the imperfection, the necessary imperfection of human 
language, and to the infirmity and the perverse ingenu- 
ity also of the human mind. It is not anything peculiar 
to the Bible. Hear tw^o opposing lawyers argue a 
point of statute law in its application to a particular 
case. Hear two opposing politicians make their 
diverse arguments in reference to the true intent and 
force of a particular clause in the United States Con- 
stitution. Is there not here as wide room for diversity 
of opinion and opposition of reasoning, as in regard 
to the meaning of any text of Scripture, or the cor- 
rectness of any point of theology ? Yet these laws and 
constitutions are made in our own language, and our 
own time, while the Bible comes to us from a remote 
age and in foreign tongues. Enough, that the Bible 
can be understood, if honestly studied, as well as any 
2 



18 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

constitution or any body of statutes can be understood. 
This much is sufficient for all practical purposes, and 
it is for practical purposes only that the Bible was 
given. 

Yet prepossessions, prejudices and passions come in 
so plentifully to darken and confuse men's minds, when 
they are reading the Bible. He opened their under- 
standings that they might understand the Scriptures, 
Men in these times need to have their understandings 
both opened and straightened out, that they may 
understand the Scriptures. 

IV. The Bible is not a specimen of God's skill as 
a writer, showing us God's mode of thought, giving us 
God's logic, and God's rhetoric, and God's style of 
historic narration. How often do we see men seeking 
out isolated passages of Scripture, and triumphantly 
saying that such expressions are unworthy of God, 
and could not have proceeded from Him. They are 
unskillful, the mode of thought is faulty, they are illog- 
ical, in bad taste, the reasoning is not conclusive, the 
narrative is liable to exception. God has not put him- 
self on trial before us in that way in the Bible, any 
more than He has in the creation — any more than He 
has promised that the Bible shall always be printed 
for us on the best of paper, with the best of type, and 
perfect freedom from typographical errors, and that 
after it is printed, it shall never be torn, nor soiled, 
nor any leaf lost : or that apostles and preachers shall 
be regularly handsome, men of fine forms and beauti- 
ful faces, and faultless elocution. It is always to be 
remembered that the writers of the Bible were ' God's 
penmen, and not God's pens.'* 

* Reply to Essays and Reviews. 



WHAT THE BIBLE IS NOT. 19 

It is not the words of the Bible that were inspired, 
it is not the thoughts of the Bible that were inspired ; 
it is the men who wrote the Bible that were inspired. 
Inspiration acts not on the man's words, not on the 
man's thoughts, but on the man himself; so that he, 
by his own spontaneity, under the impulse of the Holy 
Ghost, conceives certain thoughts and gives utterance 
to them in certain words, both the words and the 
thoughts receiving the peculiar impress of the mind 
which conceived and uttered them, and being in fact 
just as really his own, as they could have been if there 
had been no inspiration at all in the case. The birth 
and nature of Christ afford an exact illustration. The 
Holy Infant in the womb of the Virgin, though begot- 
ten of God directly without any human father, (as it 
was said, the Holy Ghost shall come upon thee and the 
power of the Highest shall overshadow thee), — this 
infant lived by his mother's life, and grew by the 
mother's growth, and partook of the mother's nature, 
and was just as much her child as he could have been 
if Joseph had been his father, the human and the 
divine in most intimate and inseparable conjunction. 
It is this very fact of the commingled and inseparable 
union of the human and divine, which constitutes the 
utility, which makes out the adaptedness to the wants 
of men, both of the incarnation of Christ and of the 
gift of the word. Inspiration generally is a purifying, 
and an elevation, and an intensification of the human 
intellect subjectively, rather than an objective sugges- 
tion and communication ; though suggestion and com- 
munication are not excluded. 

The Divine mind is, as it were, so diffused through 



20 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

the human, and the human mind is so interpenetrated 
with the Divine, that for the time being the utterances 
of the man are the word of God. 

Moreover, should we admit the facts in this objec- 
tion to be just what the objector assumes them to be ; 
even then they would only show the exact analogy 
between nature and the Bible, and thus prove, as far 
as analogy can prove anything, that they are both 
from the same author. Nature, as well as the Bible, 
has its useful things, and its good and beautiful things; 
and nature, as well as the Bible, and even to a much 
greater extent, has that which to our eyes may seem 
mean, ugly and useless. Why not apply to nature the 
same kind of criticism which you apply to the Bible, 
and say of some of the annoying creatures which you 
find on land, or of some of the queer looking animals 
which come out of the sea : u God never made such 
a looking thing as that — so odd, so out of all taste, so 
disagreeable, so useless." Why is not creation as well 
as the word fairly open to this kind of criticism? 
Certainly it is just as well grounded in the one case as 
in the other, and so far as facts go, the creation stands 
at quite a disadvantage in this particular by the side 
of the Bible. I see no way to avert the force of this 
consideration, unless we affirm with the Magi of old that 
God created the horses and the cows and the nightin- 
gales, and the Devil made the hyenas and the hornets 
and the canker-worms. Could not the old Magian press 
the believers in one only Creator with the same argu- 
ment which unbelievers now urge against the Bible, 
and with a much fairer show of justice ? God knows, if 
we do not, what He made every creature for, for every- 



WHAT THE BIBLE IS NOT. , 21 

thing He has made He has a use ; and so it is with 
every sentence in the Bible ; every paragraph has its 
own appropriate use, and will at some time or other 
come into appropriate play — or at least, how can you 
prove that it is not so, so as to derive from this source 
an argument against the Bible ? Example — the book 
of Jonah — Paul's cloak and parchment. 

And here may properly be considered an objection 
derived from certain alleged wrongs and immoralities 
in some parts of Scripture. 

1. Some of these are just such wrongs as we find 
in nature, such as the destruction of people by hostile 
armies instead of famine or pestilence, fire or storm 
— making the innocent suffer for the sins of the 
guilty; — visiting the iniquities of the fathers upon 
the children, even to the third and fourth generation, 
etc. All this happens every day, both in nature and 
Providence. 

2. Others are not immoralities at all: the manners 
and social condition of ancient times were quite diverse 
from ours, and the alleged difficulty arises wholly from 
bringing the unsuspecting innocence of childhood in 
collision with the fastidious depravity of maturer years. 

3. A true account of the ancient misdeeds of men 
otherwise good and holy, is not necessarily immoral or 
of immoral tendency. This depends wholly on the 
spirit and purpose of the narrative. A divine revela- 
tion must be true to facts, and give a strictly accurate 
view of human nature, and not a false or even a flat- 
tering one. 

4. A revelation is designedly progressive, and 
morally progressive, as well as intellectually and reli- 



22 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

giously, socially and politically, as it must be if ac- 
countable men and not creatures merely passive, are to 
be trained, freely and not compulsively, from the 
infancy of the race to its maturity ; — and we have not 
and do not pretend to have the perfection of morals 
till we have perfection of revelation in the New Tes- 
tament. The New Testament itself says, that the 
law made nothing perfect hut the bringing in of a better 
hope did. — Heb. vii. 19. And there is verily a disan- 
nulling of the commandment going before, for the weak- 
ness and unprofitableness thereof 

V. The Bible does not consist of systematic dis- 
courses, either on theology, or on morals, or on histo- 
ry, or on any other topic. 

Do not expect the Bible to be like regularly planned 
and carefully written sermons ; if you do you will never 
understand it or get much good from it. Take any of 
the finished sermons of Jeremy Taylor or H. Melville, 
of Dr. Dwight or Dr. Emmons, and lay them side by side 
with what you find in the Bible, and they are no more 
like it than the trimmed lawns, and regular paths and 
formal trees of a gentleman's grounds are like the luxu- 
riant and untouched forests of nature. So far as the 
form of composition is concerned can you possibly con- 
ceive of a greater contrast ? It may be said indeed of 
the discourses of these great and good men, that they 
were adapted to their times and to their congrega- 
tions, and this no doubt is true ; but a much better 
and grander thing can be said of the discourses in the 
Bible, to wit: that they are adapted to all times 
and to all congregations ; and this universal adapted- 
ness depends in no small degree on that very absence 



WHAT THE BIBLE IS NOT. 23 

of systematic and philosophical structure and arrange- 
ment, which is sometimes urged against them as an 
objection. All men are not philosophers, but all men 
have impulses; few men are trained to systematic 
thought, but all are capable of emotion. 

It is only in certain states of society that men can 
appreciate the artificial plantation, or are capable of 
using it, but all men in all states of society can enjoy 
and use the natural forest. 

It is with the Bible just as it is with nature, both 
coming from the same God. The truths of religion 
are found in the Bible, as plants and minerals are found 
in nature. The mineralogist and botanist must collect 
his minerals and plants one by one, as he finds them 
here and there scattered over the fields and by the 
hill side ; and he must himself, in his cabinet, systema- 
tize and arrange them in their scientific order, for God 
never does that. In arranging his plants and mine- 
rals, and assigning them to their several places, in their 
several localities, God shows an utter disregard of 
scientific order. 

So the theologian must pick out the truths of theol- 
ogy as he finds them here and there scattered about 
in the Bible ; and if he wishes to arrange them in a 
scientific liortus siccus, he must make it himself, for God 
never makes any such things. - 

VI. The Bible is not conformed to the tastes or to 
the intellectual horizon, or to the social or ethical stand 
point of any one age or nation or race. 

Each age and each race is apt to think itself, if not 
the whole human race at least the most important part 
of it, and that the Bible ought to be specially adapted 



24 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

to its own tastes and wants. But this can not be. It 
is intended for the whole race, and not for any one 
particular portion of it. Naturally each particular 
portion of the book must bear the impress of the par- 
ticular age and nation in which that portion originated. 
The Bible in its origin is an Asiatic book, and there- 
fore it bears distinctly, as it should do, the impress of 
Asiatic scenery and manners ; and yet it is remarkable 
for rising above the local and the temporary, and seiz- 
ing on those great principles which are common to 
human nature everywhere, and expressing itself in 
imagery universally understood. It describes the fer- 
tility of Palestine by the metaphor T>f a land flowing 
with milk and honey, a pleasing image and one easily 
apprehended throughout almost the entire world ; yet 
the Greenlander and the Esquimaux would doubtless 
be better pleased and have a quicker appreciation of the 
metaphor if the image were of a coast abounding with 
whale oil and blubber, or walrus meat — but why should 
the Greenlander or Esquimaux, in this respect, be grati- 
fied at the expense of all the rest of the world ? They 
have as much claim to a special gratification as the 
German or the Frenchman, the Englishman or the 
American, and no more. The Song of Solomon, 
indeed, is entirely an oriental book, adapted to ori- 
ental tastes ; the oriental religious poetry is everywhere 
of the same sort — and why should not the orientals 
have a page or two of their own book specially adapted 
to themselves? 

VII. The Bible is not a solution of the mysteries 
of existence, nor even of the perplexing problems 
which meet us in our own every day life. 



WHAT THE BIBLE IS NOT. 25 

The mystery of the actual condition of the human 
race, as it is now and as it always has been from the 
first dawning of history — the question, how can the 
existence of so much sin and misery so long continued 
be reconciled with the goodness, the wisdom and the 
power of God ? this mystery finds no solution, this 
question finds no answer in the Bible. The Bible 
addresses itself to our faith and commands us to trust 
in God, of whose goodness, wisdom and power, it says, 
we have sufficient proof, even if by searching we can 
not find out the Almighty to perfection. The sover- 
eignty of God, complete, unlimited, how is this recon- 
cilable with the complete free agency of man? If 
Christ must be sacrificed, must there not also be a 
Judas, and a Caiaphas, and a Pilate; and how then 
are they entirely free ? The Bible does not explain, 
it only asserts, the fact. The existence of God from 
all eternity, always, without beginning, what finite 
mind can form the conception of it ? The Bible makes 
no explanations of these perplexing problems, nor 
could we understand them while in this world, even 
if it did, any more than the scholar can comprehend 
the differential calculus before he has studied algebra. 

The events of our own daily life, how mysterious 
they often are to us; why was I thrown hither or 
thither? why did I suffer this or that? why are my 
circumstances thus and so? — the Bible gives us no 
information, but still tells us to trust in God and all 
will be well. We can have faith always, but knowl- 
edge is often beyond our reach. An old pilot, peering 
through a dense fog, once said in my hearing, "I know 
where we are now ; I see the cape lights." None of 



26 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

us could see a light house, nor anything else except 
impenetrable mist ; but we could trust the practised 
eye and the tried fidelity of our pilot, and in this faith 
feel as safe as if we ourselves had the knowledge or 
sight. 

Is not our blessed Saviour as trustworthy a pilot as 
man could ever sail with ? May we not believe Him, 
even when we can not see ? Let us first have the 
evidence that the Lord Jesus is what he claims to be, 
and then trust in Him. 

What then is the Bible ? 

VIII. It is God's message to honest, intelligent, 
thoughtful men, sent to them by honest, intelligent, 
thoughtful men, and a message mainly on one particu- 
lar subject, to wit, the way of escaping from the moral 
evils in which we are involved, and coming to the 
enjoyment of peace with God and in our own souls, 
for time and for eternity. 

If we are lost in a forest, and a man is sent to help 
us, we want one that will lead us out of the forest, 
and not take up the time in giving us lectures on 
botany. 

It is said that Solomon wrote a very large treatise 
on botany, and I dare say it was a very good one, but 
I never heard that it was ever received as a part of 
the Bible. 

I was once in a large ship with some four hundred 
souls on board ; and by heavy fogs and baffling winds 
and adverse currents, we were drifted on to the rocky 
shores of Nova Scotia, without any knowledge of our 
exact position. We could not see half the ship's 
length in any direction for the fog ; but we could hear 
all around us the roar of distant breakers, and we 



WHAT THE BIBLE IS, 27 

knew that we were in danger. What could we do ? 
We lay as still as possible on the water, and tried not 
to move. We fired guns as signals of distress. After 
a while, by listening attentively between the booming 
of the guns, we could hear the plashing of oars in the 
distance. Then we fired the oftener that the oarsmen 
might be guided by the sound. Presently two boats 
filled with men came alongside. They were strong, 
healthy looking men, but they were not very hand- 
some nor very well dressed. They did not seem to 
be learned men, and I suppose they had never studied 
geology, and had formed no theory in regard to the 
formation of the rocks along the shores of Nova Sco- 
tia. But they knew where the rocks were, and could 
tell us how to steer so as to avoid them ; and we fol- 
lowed their directions and asked them no questions 
about geology, and got safe into Halifax, and lived to 
study geology afterwards in the books appropriate for 
that purpose. Now was not that the right way ? 

But are there not sometimes in the Bible mistakes 
and inconsistencies in numbers ? and in the names of 
individuals and of nations ? 

Doubtless literal and numeral errors can be found 
in all copies of the Bible. There was never yet a 
book printed so carefully but there were some typo- 
graphical errors in it, and the liability to such errors 
was much greater when books were perpetuated only 
in manuscript — and numbers and names are the very 
places where such errors most frequently occur. The 
Hebrews were sometimes under idolatrous kings, and 
sometimes in captivity to their enemies ; and then they 
lost almost all the copies of their sacred books. Id 



28 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

the early part of the reign of Josiah, scarcely a single 
copy of the Pentateuch could be found in the whole 
city of Jerusalem. (II Kings, 22.) Their letters and 
numerals in many cases were very much alike and 
easily mistaken for each other. No wonder if in the 
long course of ages there should, under such circum- 
stances, some errors in names and numbers of little 
importance to after ages creep in ; but these no more 
impair the authority of the revelation than misprints 
destroy a statute book. Misprints may be so numerous 
and gross, and on points of such importance, as to 
destroy the usefulness and authority of a book — but 
this certainly is not the case with the Bible, nor with 
the statute book of any respectable human common- 
wealth. 

Compare II Chronicles, 21: 20, 22: 2, with II 
Kings, 8:26. 

Are there not passages here and there which could 
not have been written at the time and by the authors 
supposed ? 

The art of bookmaking, like all other arts, was in 
its beginnings exceedingly rude and imperfect In 
the times of the Bible writers there were no such 
things as title pages, chapters, headings, marginal notes, 
appendix or index. Books were written full on every 
page, with lines »of single letters without any division 
of paragraphs, syllables, or even words — just line after 
line, continuous rows of letters, completely filling the 
page, without any divisions whatever. Of course 
what modern writers would put into a title or heading, 
a foot note, or an appendix, or index, in ancient wri- 
tings comes right in as a part of the original page 



WHAT THE BIBLE IS. 29 

Here is all the ground there is for the objection stated. 
The passages objected to are just the foot notes of a 
subsequent editor, and not forgeries or fraudulent 
interpolations. 

But does not the first chapter of Genesis come in 
direct collision with the well ascertained facts of geo- 
logical science? No. Understand first the purpose 
of Moses and his mode of writing, and you will see 
that there neither is nor can be any collision between 
him and science of any kind. The Bible does not 
state, and never professes to state, scientific facts in 
scientific forms, but only phenomena, or appearances 
to the eye of a spectator. For example, that the earth 
revolves on its axis from west to east once in twenty- 
four hours, thus producing day and night, is a scien- 
tific fact ; this the Bible never states, nor even alludes 
to. Indeed I do not suppose that the writers of the 
Bible knew anything about it, for " inspiration is not 
omniscience." That the sun rises in the east and passes 
along in the heavens till he sets in the west, is a phe- 
nomenon, an appearance to the human eye, and this 
and this only is what the Bible speaks of, just as 
in the language of common life and common sense 
everywhere, both among the learned and unlearned. 
While the statements of the Bible are true to the phe- 
nomena, the appearances, they are right, they have 
nothing to do with the scientific facts, and can not 
come in collision with them, any more than the decis- 
ions of a judge in the supreme court can come in col- 
lision with the governor's coach ; for the two subjects 
are not of the same kind, they belong to two entirely 
different spheres of thought, they do not travel at all 



30 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

on the same road ; and how can they come in collision ? 
A decision of a judge can come in collision with an 
act of the legislature ; and a farmer's wagon may come 
in collision with the governor's coach ; but there is 
and can be no collision crosswise from one sphere of 
objects to another. 

To interpret the first chapter of Genesis, as a geo- 
logical essay, and to attempt to remove from it, by 
scientific methods, geological difficulties, seems to me 
like interpreting the parable of the sower as an agri- 
cultural essay, and attempting to avoid the difficulty 
that fowls of the air devoured only the seed that fell 
by the way side, by learned inquiries as to whether 
birds in ancient times could fly over fences, and whether 
they were not obliged to keep the road, and solemnly 
imagining the sustaining of the latter supposition to 
be essential to the vindication of the truthfulness of 
Christ as a religious teacher. How much better to 
look at the simple fact just as it existed, to wit, that 
in the eastern countries, as now in Germany and France, 
the farms were seldom fenced, and the fields for the 
most part were guarded by old men, women and chil- 
dren, whose duty it was to keep away the birds as well 
as the cattle — and this practice very generally obtains 
in those countries at the present day, simply because 
that there old men, women and children are cheaper 
than fencing stuff. In the interpretation of so plain 
and homely a book as the Bible, a knowledge of the 
facts and good common sense are generally much bet- 
ter guides than scientific ingenuity or metaphysical 
subtilty. Everything to its appropriate use. I would 
not take a broad axe to mend a pen with, nor a pen 
knife to hew ship timber 



WHAT THE BIBLE IS. 31 

The Bible was not written with reference to science 
or philosophy, but with reference to the feelings ar>d 
impressions and needs of the great masses of mankind, 
and they are neither scientific men nor philosophers. 

Moses in the six days work of the creation, gives an 
account of the fitting up of our planetary system for 
its present race of inhabitants ; and intends to show in 
opposition to the pantheistic, polytheistic and atheistic 
cosmologies of ancient times, that all existing things 
are the work of one and the same self-existent, self- 
conscious and intelligent God. According to the 
analogy of all revelation, these transactions were not 
narrated to him in words for him to write them down 
as he heard them, but he saw the transactions all pass- 
ing before his eyes in prophetic, or rather ecstatic, vis- 
ion, and he wrote them down just as he saw them. 
Like all popular descriptions the language is phenom- 
enal, the events are described as they would meet the 
eye of a spectator, and not at all in accordance with 
the scientific verities. Each day begins a process 
which goes on indefinitely, which is going on still; 
and no one day completes the process even of that 
day. It was not till the third day that the sun became 
the great luminary of the system. Light is not con- 
fined to the sun even now ; it exists of itself, and en- 
tirely independent of the sun. And who knows, so 
as with authority to contradict Moses on this point, 
that the sun did become the luminary of the system 
before the third day, or that before the sun became 
the luminary of the system a day must be just twenty- 
four of our hours, neither more nor less ; or that the 
order of the origin of things is not the order which 



32 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Moses has given ; or that if there had been a spectator 
of the scene, the successive appearances to his eye, 
would not have been in accordance with the Mosaic 
description ? Many of the most eminent of scientific 
men have asserted that they must have been so — and 
what scientific man has yet demonstrated that they 
could not so have been ? 

But after all, remember, and the idea can not be too 
strongly enforced, that inspiration is not omniscience. 
The apostle Paul could write the epistle to the Ro- 
mans, but he never knew how to make a steam engine 
or run a locomotive. The apostle John, lovely as he 
appears in his gospel, and magnificent as he truly is in 
the apocalypse, never knew how to make a watch or 
construct a kaleidoscope. There are men now in 
every city of Christendom, who, though very poorly 
qualified to be religious instructors and explain the 
ways of God to men, can make electrical machines and 
construct steam engines, and manage the magnetic 
telegraph better than all the twelve apostles put 
together ; and I am quite ready to believe that Moses 
knew nothing at all of the science of geology. 

Look not into the Bible for what God never put in 
it — look not there for mathematics or mechanics, for 
metaphysical distinctions or the abstruse sciences ; but 
look there simply for the way of spiritual life and 
salvation, and you will find enough, an abundance for 
all your spiritual needs. 

I can select two chapters from the New Testament, 
and if all the Bible were lost except these two chap- 
ters, they alone, if we could be assured of their truth, 
would guide us safely through all the darkness and 



WHAT THE BIBLE IS. 33 

sorrow of this life, and bring us to the haven of light 
and peace above. The two chapters to which I refer 
are the third chapter of the Gospel of John, and the 
eighth chapter of Paul's Epistle to the Romans. 

If of all the Bible we had only these two chapters 
left to us, and we could be assured that they are 
from God, and of divine authority, they alone would 
be sufficient to alleviate the sufferings of life, and cheer 
us with the most glowing and glorious hopes. The 
long continued, unalleviated distresses of mankind 
sometimes fill us with painful doubts as to the nature 
and purposes of our Creator ; but here in the third 
chapter of John it is explicitly declared, " For God so 
loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, 
that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but 
have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into 
the world to condemn the world ; but that the world 
through him might be saved.'" Whatever may be the 
difficulty, then, it is certainly no want of love on the 
part of our Heavenly Father. 

When we look away from the world around us, and 
turn our thoughts within upon ourselves, we see that 
we are in ruins. We long for a virtue which we have 
not, and see no way of attaining. What, then, are we 
lost ? No, for in this same chapter, we are told of an 
inward regeneration, a new birth, by the power of the 
Holy Spirit, which brings us into the kingdom of 
God, and at the same time, of an outward regeneration 
by water baptism, which brings us into God's visible 
church on earth, which establishes a covenant relation 
between Him and us, and gives us all the advantages 
of such a relation. "Verily, verily, I say unto thee, 
3 



34 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Except a man be born again he can not see the king- 
dom of God. Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a 
man be born when he is old ? can he enter the second 
time into his mother's womb, and be born ? Jesus 
answered, Yerilj, verily, I say unto thee, Except a 
man be born of water and of the Spirit, he can not 
enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born 
of the flesh is flesh ; and that which is born of the 
Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye 
must be born again. The wind bloweth where it list- 
eth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not 
tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth; so is 
every one that is born of the Spirit." But are these 
advantages reserved for a distant future, or can we 
have a present realization of them? The eighth of 
Romans tells us, " There is therefore now no condem- 
nation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk 
not after the flesh but after the Spirit. For the law 
of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free 
from the law of sin and death." But how far may 
these blessings be extended ? Are they confined within 
narrow limits ? Do they include only a few ? Let us 
hear. "For we know that the whole creation groan- 
eth and travaileth in pain together until' now. And 
not only they, but ourselves also, which have the first 
fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within 
ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemp- 
tion of our body. For the earnest expectation of the 
creature waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of 
God. For the creature 'was made subject to vanity, 
not willingly, but by reason of him who hath subjected 
the same in hope ; Because the creature itself also shal] 



HOW TO USE THE BIBLE. 35 

be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the 
glorious liberty of the children of God." Here then 
is enough for our salvation and our comfort, if we will 
but take it aright. How much more when we have 
all the riches of the whole Bible ! 

Yet there are men who would deprive us of our 
Bible. On the most frivolous pretexts, by the most 
groundless objections, they would rob us of the com- 
forts of the divine word, and give us nothing in their 
place. As a recent writer has well remarked,* 

u Weary human nature lays its head on the bosom 
of the Divine Word, or it has nowhere to lay its head. 
Tremblers on the verge of the dark and terrible val- 
ley, which parts the land of the living from the untried 
hereafter, take this hand of human tenderness yet of 
godlike strength, or they totter into the gloom with- 
out prop or stay. They who look their last upon the 
beloved dead, listen to this voice of soothing and 
peace, or else death is no uplifting of everlasting 
doors, and no enfolding in everlasting arms, but an 
ending as appalling to the reason as to the senses, the 
usher to a charnel house whose highest faculties and 
noblest feelings lie crushed with the animal wreck, an 
infinite tragedy, maddening and sickening, a blackness 
of darkness forever." 

The Bible has various and infinite adaptations. 
Some portions are better understood in some parts of 
the world than in others. Some parts were better 
understood in the past than now — and other parts will 
be better understood in the future than ever before — 
while again there are other portions more closely 

* Reply to Essays and Reviews, p. 340-41, English edition. 



36 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

adapted to the present times than to any other portion 
of the world's history — for it was written not for any 
one age or nation, but equally for all ages and nations 
— and with a divine foreknowledge of all these needs 
and adaptations. 

Says Lord Bacon : 

" The Scriptures being written to the thoughts of 
men, and to the succession of all ages, with a foresight 
of heresies, contradictions, differing estates of the 
church, yea, and particularly of the elect, are not to 
be interpreted only according to the latitude of the 
proper sense of the place, and respectively toward 
that present occasion when the words were utter- 
ed, or in precise congruity or contexture with the 
words before or after, or in contemplation of the pres- 
ent scope of the place ; but have in themselves, not 
only totally or collectively, but distributively in clauses 
and words, infinite springs and streams of doctrine, to 
water the church in every part ; and therefore, as the 
literal sense is, as it were, the main stream or river, 
so the moral sense chiefly, and sometimes the alle- 
gorical or typical are those whereof the church hath 
most use ; not that I wish men to be bold in allegories, 
or indulge delight in allusions ; but that I much con- 
demn that interpretation of Scripture which is only 
after the manner as men use to interpret a profane 
book." 

And again this same great philosopher speaks of " a 
latitude which is agreeable and familiar unto the divine 
prophecies, being of the nature of their author, with 
whom a thousand years are but as one day ; therefore 
they are not fulfilled punctually at once, but have spring- 



HOW TO USE THE BIBLE. 37 

trig and germinant accomplishment throughout many- 
ages, though the height or fulness of them may refer to 
some one age." (Advancement of learning, B. ii.) 

This book should be read daily and not too much at 
a time, with the expectation of finding in it that and 
that only which God has put in it. It should be read 
with thoughtfulness, with honesty, with reverence and 
with prayer. And it should always be borne in mind, 
that God saves us by His Word and by His Spirit, 
neither without the other, neither by the Word without 
the Spirit, nor ordinarily by the Spirit without the 
Word ; but usually by both together in harmonious 
and inseparable co-operation. 



CHAPTER SECOND. 

THE KIND OF EVIDENCE ON WHICH WE RECEIVE THE 
BOOKS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. 

Doubtless to the great body of Christian believers, 
the chief evidence for the truth of the New Testament 
is the moral evidence ; that is, they feel within them- 
selves urgent moral needs, irrepressible spiritual aspi- 
rations ; these needs and aspirations are all supplied 
and satisfied by the teachings of the New Testament: 
these books they feel are just what the human soul 
wants, and He who made the soul and knows its wants 
would naturally afford the appropriate supply. While 
in the exercise of true devotional feeling, the devout 
Christian no more needs an external proof of the truth 
and divinity of the New Testament, than Elijah needed 
a metaphysical proof of the existence of God when 
he was ascending to heaven in his fiery chariot. This 
is as it should be, and this is the very highest kind of 
proof. All men need revealed religion, but very few 
indeed have the power or opportunity to make the 
external evidences of revealed religion a study. 

Yet this moral proof is available only to the indi- 
vidual himself, and he can not make it evidence to 
another. And to the most devotional there come 
hours of mental darkness, when assaults seem formida- 
ble and faith is easily shaken from without and will 



40 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

be likely to fail unless strongly fortified on external 
grounds. Hence discussions of the external evidences 
of revealed religion, adapted to the various shapes 
which objections assume in different ages and circum- 
stances, will always be necessary. The old defences 
will not answer for the new assailants, either as regards 
the believers or the unbelievers, or those who are 
simply doubtful and inquiring. 

The question which is now most perplexing to those 
who have time to read, but neither time nor means 
for thorough study, is this : How is it that there are 
such diversities of opinion as to the genuineness of 
the books of the New Testament? So many dif- 
ferent hypotheses as to the authors of the sacred books, 
and all maintained by arguments more or less plausi- 
ble ? The very fact that the books of the New Testa- 
ment can be subjected to such treatment seems of 
itself, to some minds, to throw a shade of doubt over 
the evidence of their genuineness and authority. A 
well-known school of German writers began more than 
half a century since by denying the authenticity of 
the book of Revelation, and now, after having gone 
through with the whole of the New Testament, and 
placed all the other books a century or two later than 
the authors to whom, by Christian antiquity, they have 
been ascribed, they have at length come round to the 
conclusion, I believe with entire unanimity, that the 
book of Revelation is a genuine relic, and possibly the 
only genuine relic of the very first age of the Christian 
church. 

How is it that the books of the New Testament can 
be subjected to such treatment? The answer is very 



: VIDENCE FOR THE NEW TESTAMENT. 41 

simple. It is done by ignoring or rejecting all exter- 
nal testimony in regard to these books, and judging 
of them by the critic's own subjective views of the 
internal evidence only. Any modern works, subjected 
to the same kind of criticism, would be lost in the 
same diversity and uncertainty. For example, the 
letters of Junius are deficient in external testimony as 
to their authorship. The consequence has been an 
endless diversity of opinion on this subject, innumera- 
ble hypotheses, all sustained with more or less of acute- 
ness and plausibility from internal evidence, and to 
this day there is an entire uncertainty. 

Sir Walter Scott's novels were at first published 
anonymously, there was no external testimony as to 
their authorship ; the public was left to internal evi- 
dence only ; the consequence was an endless diversity 
of opinion, different hypotheses sustained by argu- 
ment of equal degrees of plausibility, and an entire 
uncertainty; until Sir Walter himself avowed the 
authorship, his publishers confirmed it, and thus the 
requisite external testimony was supplied ; and since 
then there has been no doubt. And if such be the 
case where we are well acquainted with the writers, 
and with the history and literature of the period, how 
much more emphatically must it be true where we 
know almost nothing of the literature of the period 
and place except by the books themselves which are 
in question. It is as easy by such a method to call in 
question, to assign to various authors, to maintain by 
plausible arguments discordant hypotheses in regard 
to the products of modern literature as in regard 
to the books of the New Testament. In respect 



42 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

to Robertson's History of Charles V., or Milton's Para» 
dise Lost, how do we know that these works belong 
to the authors named ? By external testimony and 
by external testimony only. Reject this or discredit 
it, put no faith in it, and we are all at sea in regard to 
every literary production of every period of the world. 
Combined with external testimony internal evidence • 
has an important place and use ; but as to that alone, 
it is like a sail without mast or cordage, it can indeed 
be blown away by the wind, but it can never move or 
stay a ship. How much more is all this true of the 
books ascribed to the apostles and evangelists, to 
Matthew and Mark, to Luke and John, to Paul and 
Peter, or any other of the writers of the New Testa- 
ment i Who knows enough of the literature or of the 
persons of that period and class of writers to decide, 
for example, that a certain book -ascribed to Paul was 
written by Apollos? Who knows anything, indeed, 
except from the books themselves, of the mental char- 
acteristics of Paul or Apollos ? It is often impossible, 
^by internal evidence alone, to assign even the age of 
a book, much less its author. We may sometimes 
prove by internal evidence only, that a certain book 
does not belong to a particular period, if, for example, 
positive anachronisms are woven into the structure of 
the work, allusions to things which did not then exist, 
or to events which had not then occurred, (except 
where we admit the prophetic gift, or can show that 
the allusions are by a later hand,) but it is not so easy 
to decide by internal evidence alone to what period 
exactly a particular work does belong. Many exam- 
ples are on record of gross mistakes in this regard 



EVIDENCE FOR THE NEW TESTAMENT. 43 

About forty years since Dr. Wilhelm Meinhold of the 
island of Rugen, published his celebrated novel of the 
Amber Witch. It purported to be the copy of an 
old manuscript found in a church there, and written 
by a clergyman of the time of Gustavus Adolphus. 
Critics who could decide from internal evidence alone 
that the books of the New Testament could not have 
been written earlier than the second or third centuries 
of the christian era, were very easily deceived by the 
Amber Witch, and pronounced it a genuine produc- 
tion of the period of the Thirty Years' War, being 
two centuries out of the way in both cases. 

But is there not a lack of external testimony in 
regard to the books of the New Testament, so that 
we are obliged to rely on internal evidence alone, 
vague as it is, for want of something better? No, 
there is no deficiency of this kind ; the external testi- 
mony is abundant, more than we have for any other 
ancient book whatever, more than we have for most 
modern books. The English writer, Dr. Nathaniel 
Lardner, and the German, John Kirchhofer, have in 
their works drawn out this testimony with great mi- 
nuteness of detail, and full quotations of passages ; and 
a very good outline, exhibiting the nature and quality 
of this testimony, is given by Dr. Paley in his Evidences, 
chapter IX. Many of the early Christian writings 
which contained the external testimony to the genu- 
ineness of our sacred books, are now lost ; but many 
of them are also preserved : and of those which are 
lost, we have passages which we need on this sub- 
ject quoted in full by Eusebius. 

Eusebius is a very important witness in the whole 
matter of Christian evidence, and therefore he is gen- 



44 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

erally the first object of attack among unbelievers and 
skeptics. 

With others also he fares hard, and can hardly ex- 
pect exact justice, for the ultra orthodox dislike him 
on account of his mildness and aversion to severe treat- 
ment of theological opponents, and the ultra protest- 
ants on account of his willing acceptance of the eccle- 
siastical organization that had begun to prevail before 
his birth, and was fully established by Constantine. 

It is necessary then that we should give some infor- 
mation in regard to this man and his opportunities of 
knowledge, and his credibility as a witness, which has 
been so bitterly impugned. He was the bishop of the 
church at Caesarea, in Palestine, at the close of the 
third and beginning of the fourth century of the Chris- 
tian era, and he became the personal friend and eccle- 
siastical adviser of Constantine, after that emperor had 
embraced Christianity. In that church at Caesarea 
before A. D. 300, there was a remarkable man who 
seemed raised up by Providence to do just the work 
in regard to the Christian books which was needed for 
that and all subsequent time. This was Pamphilus. 

If there ever was a special providence here was one, 
for if the work had not then been done it never could 
have been done afterwards. Pamphilus was the intimate 
bosom friend of his pastor, Eusebius, so that it was 
said by their contemporaries that there seemed to be 
but one soul between them both, and Eusebius gave 
to himself the surname of Pamphilus, after the name 
of this friend. This Pamphilus had a great passion 
for collecting books, the books written by Christians ; 
and every scrap of Christian literature down to his 



EVIDENCE FOR THE NEW TESTAMENT 45 

own time, which he could find, he laid hold of and 
stored it away in his library. He was to the Christians 
of that age very much what the late Thomas Dowse 
was to his literary neighbors in Cambridge. When 
there was a Christian book which he could neither 
purchase nor beg for his library, he would laboriously 
copy it entire with his own hand. In this way, by 
copying them himself, he became possessed of all the 
folios of the works of Origen, which were then very 
difficult to be obtained. He died early the death of 
a martyr, and bequeathed his entire library to the 
church at Caesarea, (as Mr. Dowse did his to the Mass- 
achusetts Historical Society ;) and Eusebius, his pastor, 
all his life long had the use of it. Eusebius was a 
voracious reader and voluminous writer, as hungry to 
read and write books as Pamphilus had been to pur- 
chase and own them. Thus Eusebius became inti- 
mately acquainted with everything pertaining to the 
Christian literature of the first three centuries, and 
was well qualified to give testimony in regard to all 
the Christian books of that period. This testimony is 
given very copiously in his historical writings, which 
are still extant and tolerably complete. He was not a 
bigoted churchman, he was not rigidly orthodox, he 
rather leaned towards Arianism, and on all theological 
and ecclesiastical questions he was inclined to take the 
liberal side ; and he shows no disposition to exagge- 
rate the number or the value of the Christian sacred 
books, but quite the contrary. His testimony, there- 
fore, especially where it is in favor of a book, is clearly 
unexceptionable ; and the many literal quotations which 
he makes on this topic from early Christian writings, 



46 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

now lost, are altogether invaluable. But it is said that 
Eusebius, though a man of great learning and indus- 
try, and on the whole reasonably honest, was credu- 
lous, vain and weak, a flatterer of Constantine, and 
therefore not a reliable witness. Granting that these 
were the faults of Eusebius, it would not materially 
affect his testimony on the particular points for which 
we here use it. The genuineness of this or that sacred 
book was not generally a question on which he had 
any prejudices or interests to subserve, as is perfectly 
evident from his writings; and it was not a matter 
which could usually affect the accuracy of his quota 
tions from preceding authors. Allowing that he was 
very much such a kind of man as Cotton Mather (and 
I am inclined to think that in many respects he was), 
yet Mather is a very important authority in the early 
history of New England, and though a very poor wit- 
ness on some subjects, is a perfectly reliable one on 
others. Mather, on account of his credulity and his 
prejudice in respect to those particular subjects, is a 
poor witness in regard to papists, and heretics, and 
witches, and wonderful providences, and the like ; 
but who can impeach his testimony or dispense with it 
on such topics as the pastors and members of the early 
churches in Boston, the books which they wrote and 
approved, the meeting of the synod at Cambridge, 
and the articles and platform there adopted, the foun- 
ders and first graduates of Harvard College, etc.? 
And who will dispute the general accuracy of the numer- 
ous quotations from other authors which axe found in 
his writings ? On all such points Mather is a reliable 
witness, and it is on such points as these that we use 



EVIDENCE FOR THE NEW TESTAMENT. 47 

his authority in the early New England history, and our 
early history would be meagre and bare indeed with- 
out him. It is precisely on points like these that we 
use the authority of Eusebius in early church history, 
and especially in regard to the Christian sacred books ; 
on such points he is a reliable witness; and if we 
throw him out, we must, like the Tuebingen critics, 
rely on our imagination for many of our most impor- 
tant facts. Reject Eusebius, and what have we for a 
history of the Christian churches of the first three cen- 
turies, or of the books used as Scripture in those 
churches ? Eusebius is in the main a reliable witness, 
as much so certainly as the great body of historians, 
ancient or modern ; where other testimony is accessi- 
ble his historical statements are generally borne out 
by it, and where we have opportunity to compare his 
quotations with the authors themselves we generally 
find them correct. I know of but one exception. It is 
alleged that in one passage he wilfully misquotes Jose- 
phus. Let us examine this allegation. Josephus, giv- 
ing an account of the death of Herod, says he saw 
just before he expired an owl sitting on a rope above 
him a messenger (ayyelog, angel,*) of evil tidings to him 
as it had before, when he was a prisoner at Rome, 
been a messenger of good. Eusebius, in quoting the 
passage, omits the word ftovfava, oivl, and retains only 
ayyslog, angel or messenger, and for this he is accused of 
falsehood, and his credibility throughout hotly assailed. 
But Eusebius, certainly, and Josephus, probably, re- 
garded the appearance not as the natural bird, but as 
a supernatural messenger or angel in the form of the 
bird, as the Holy Spirit assumed the form of a dove: 



48 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

and if so, he gives the exact sense of Josephus if not 
all his words. Moreover if he has misquoted by the 
omission of a word, willingly or unwillingly, what 
other historian, ancient or modern, as voluminous 
as he, has not been many times guilty of errors 
even graver than this? Very few of our popular 
historians, if subjected to so severe a test, would 
escape so well as Eusebius ; and are they to be set 
down as utterly unworthy of credit on all topics on 
account of these occasional errors ? Is Macaulay to 
be wholly discredited on account of his blunders, ob- 
stinate and wilful as they would seem to be, in regard 
to William Penn, or his scarcely less inexcusable mis- 
representations of Lord Bacon and the Duke of Marl- 
borough ? Is Hume to be regarded as utterly untruth- 
ful, and rejected as false on all subjects, on account 
of his inexcusably mendacious statements in respect 
to Cromwell ? Read, especially in the Greek, the pas- 
sages referred to, in Eusebius' Eccl. Hist, II. 10, and 
Josephus' Antiq., XVIII. 6: 7, and XIX. 8:2; and 
compare with them the one-sided, and unreasonable 
criticisms of Alford in his Com. on Acts XII, 2. 

Dr. Schaff, in his truly learned History of the Apos- 
tolic Church (p. 52) bears the following noble and 
truthful testimony to Eusebius as a historian. " The 
title father of church history belongs undoubtedly to 
the learned, candid and moderate Eusebius, — in the 
same sense in which Herodotus is called the father of 
profane history." 

u His mild disposition, love of peace, and aversion 
to doctrinal controversies and exclusive formulas of 
orthodoxy, have brought upon him the suspicion of 



EVIDENCE FOR THE NEW TESTAMENT 49 

having favored the Arian or Semi-Arian heresy ; but 
without sufficient foundation. It is certain that he 
signed the symbol of Nice, and at least substantially 
agreed to it ; though for himself he preferred the 
lower terminology of his favorite Origen concerning 
the divinity of Christ." 

Such is the deliberate judgment of a Protestant of 
well known candor and erudition ; but many so-called 
Protestants are in the habit of treating the testimony 
not only of Eusebius but of all the early Christians, 
subsequent to the apostolic age, as if it were utterly 
worthless, and not at all to be relied upon in making 
up a judgment on any subject. This is doubtless a reac- 
tion from the half deification of the primitive church 
fathers by the Catholics ; but it is no less false and 
no less misleading than that opposite extreme. If the 
men who successfully achieved such a revolution as 
was the triumph of the Christian religion against such 
odds as the entire force of the Greek and Latin litera- 
ture, and the whole power, civil and military, of the 
Roman empire, at the cost of peace, prosperity, repu- 
tation, even of life itself, in the face of every possible 
danger, deprivation, distress and torture — a moral 
revolution by purely moral means, of the most thorough 
and tremendous character that the world has ever wit- 
nessed — if, I say, the men who did all this were triflers 
and liars, and unworthy of belief, incompetent to give 
testimony on the plainest matters of fact, then surely this 
must have been the strangest, the most unaccountable 
of all the chapters in the history of the world. To say 
the very least of it, the testimony of the early Chris- 
tians, in regard to their own affairs, is as good and as 
worthy of belief as any human testimony whatever. 



50 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

But it is sometimes sneeringly said, that it was the 
divine power and not the human which established 
Christianity in the world. True, but when God has a 
great and good work to be done in His church He does 
not select fools and knaves to do it. He selects men to 
do His work who have the natural capacities and the 
acquired abilities to do exactly the work which is to 
be done. It was so in the great German reformation, 
it was so in the great Puritan revolution in England, 
it was so in the great Wesleyan movement, it is always 
so. The great struggle which eventuated in the estab- 
lishment of Christianity in the world formed no excep- 
tion to this general rule. The Christians of the first 
three centuries were men naturally and morally fitted 
for the huge task which was laid upon them, and which 
they successfully finished. They, like all other men, 
had their faults, and some faults peculiar to their age 
and circumstances ; but they were among the strongest 
and noblest men which the world has ever seen, and 
fully competent to give reliable testimony as to all the 
facts of their own history and literature. To suppose, 
as some seem to do, that Christianity all suddenly died 
out at the close of the apostolic period, and lay dead 
for twelve or fourteen centuries more, and never 
breathed again ; and then suddenly started forth full 
grown in the persons of the Protestant reformers, like 
Minerva from the head of Jupiter, is to think and 
reason in a most childish and frivolous way. 

But, it is objected, that on a subject so momentous as 
that of religion, ought we not to have something bet- 
ter than mere human testimony to rely upon ? There 
is the divine testimony within, to all who desire it and 



EVIDENCE FOR THE NEW TESTAMENT. 51 

rightly seek for it. The really good man hath the 
witness in himself — he knoweth the doctrine whether 
it is of God. And as to the external word, if there 
were as great moral risk in believing it as there is in 
rejecting it, the question above stated might have some 
significance. But notoriously all the risk is in reject- 
ing, there is none at all in believing. On the princi- 
ples of the unbelievers themselves, no one is made the 
worse in time, no one can be made the worse in eter- 
nity, by a rational, considerate, consistent belief in the 
Christian sacred books. It is the order of providence, 
that for our important practical knowledge on all sub- 
jects, we must depend to a great extent on human 
testimony. We are made to depend on each other. 
It is so in medicine, in law, in politics, in all the ordi- 
nary business relations of life; men of good moral 
principles and sound common sense, get on without 
essential inconvenience from this cause ; and so it is 
and so it must be, creation being as it is, in regard to 
the evidence, the external evidence, on which we 
receive the sacred books which contain the divine 
revelations to us. 

In regard to direct testimony, each separate book 
of the Bible must stand in a great measure by itself, 
and the witnesses can be most advantageously exam- 
ined when we come to treat of the individual books 
each by itself. This will be the subject of subsequent 
chapters. There are general testimonies to the whole, 
which will not be overlooked in our discussions. 
Some of the most satisfactory testimonies are those 
which are merely incidental, where there is no intention 
of testifying, but the witness is intent on another topic. 



52 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Such, kind of testimony is in all cases particularly valu- 
able. I will here give an example or two to illustrate 
my meaning. 

Polycarp, the disciple of John the apostle, and who 
was appointed by the apostles bishop of Smyrna, and 
was well acquainted with several of them, (Irenaeus, III. 
3 : 4,) in fragments of his writings, which have come 
down to us, has incidental notices of this kind : " Mat- 
thew testifies that the Lord said that Moses wrote of 
Adam's speaking in this manner, this now is bone of 
my bone and flesh of my flesh, for this cause shall a man 
leave father and mother " etc. (Matt. xix. 5.) 

" Mark begins with the ancient prophetic announce- 
ment of the advent of Christ ; Luke begins from the 
priesthood of Zacharia ; John takes his exordium from 
the author of our redemption." These extracts are 
neither full nor literal ; the sense of Polycarp is given 
in an abridged form to show the kind of incidental 
testimony to our sacred books from the ancient fathers 
who had been in immediate communication with the 
apostles themselves, and so onward. But as some, 
though without sufficient reason, doubt the genuine- 
ness of these fragments of Polycarp, we will add a 
passage or two from his epistle to the Philipians, in 
regard to which there has never been reasonable ques- 
tion. " Do we not know that the saints shall judge the 
world as Paul teaches ?" (I Cor. vi. 2.) "I trust ye are 
well exercised in the Holy Scriptures." u As in these 
Scriptures it is said, Be ye angry and sin not : and 
Let not the sun go down upon your wrath : " (Eph. 
i% 26.) Remember what the Lord said, teaching: 
Judge not that ye be not judged ; with what measure 
yc mete, it shall be measured to you again." fMatt. 



EVIDENCE FOR THE NEW TESTAMENT. 53 

vii. 1, 2.) " Whom God hath raised up, having loosed 
the pains of hell:" (Acts, ii. 24.) In this one short 
epistle of about five or six common duodecimo pages, 
Polycarp has incidental allusions to, and express quota- 
tions from, no less than sixteen of the books of our 
present New Testament ; and in all fairness we might 
extend the number to twenty, for the four called doubt- 
ful are scarcely to be justly doubted. 

Origen lived in the latter part of the second and 
the early part of the third century. He was one of 
the most learned, indefatigable, sincere and honest 
men that ever lived. In his seventh sermon on the 
book of Joshua, allegorizing, after his manner, the 
account of the taking of Jericho, he thus speaks: u But 
when our Lord Jesus Christ came, of whom Joshua, 
the son of Nun, was but a type, he sent forth the 
priests, his apostles, bearing well-beaten trumpets, 
sounding the glorious heavenly doctrine. Matthew 
sounds first with the priestly trumpet in his gospel ; 
Mark, also, and Luke and John, sounded with their 
priestly trumpets. Peter, likewise, sounds aloud with 
the two trumpets of his epistles ; James, also, and Jude ; 
John sounds again with his trumpet in his epistles and 
revelation. Last of all sounds he who said (I Cor., 
iv. 9) For I think that God hath set forth us the apostles 
last, and sounding with the trumpet of his fourteen 
epistles, he threw down to the foundations the walls of 
Jericho, and all the engines of idolatry, and the schemes 
of the philosophers." 

Another brief extract of the same kind from the same 
author. It is in his homily on Genesis, xxvi. 18-22, 
41 Thus Isaac digged again the wells of water which 



54 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

the servants of his father had digged. One servant of 
his father was Moses, who dug the well of the law ; 
other servants of his father were David and Solomon, 
and the prophets, and all they who wrote the books 
of the Old Testament. Isaac, therefore, again digged 
new wells; yea the servants of Isaac digged. The 
servants of Isaac are Matthew, Mark, Luke and John ; 
his servants, also, are Peter, James, and Jude; and 
likewise the apostle Paul ; who all dig the wells of the 
New Testament." 

It is in this incidental way that the ancients make 
us acquainted with the books of the New Testament 
as they had them ; and to quote all that they say, even 
in the small portion of their writings which has come 
down to us, would make a book larger than the New 
Testament itself. 

Origen, then, and Polycarp, the one a cotemporary 
with the first publishers of the New Testament, and 
the other about a century later, had the same New 
Testament books which we now have ; and we have 
an unbroken series of the same kind of testimony from 
the apostle John to the great theologian of the western 
church, St Augustin. It will be found exhibited in 
full in the English works of Dr. Nathaniel Lardner, 
and in the German work of Kirchhofer, alluded to 
above. These works contain not only the copious ex- 
tracts from the genuine writings of the fathers, by 
Lardner translated into English, and by Kirchhofer 
in the original languages, but also the most exact refer- 
ences to book and paragraph, giving the reader the 
amplest opportunity for verification. 

We have thus set forth the kind of evidence on 



EVIDENCE FOB THE NEW TESTAMENT. 55 

which we receive the Christian sacred books ; we have 
shown it to be the same kind of evidence which is 
universally admitted to be satisfactory, and is found to 
be satisfactory, in all the most important transactions 
of our daily lives ; and it is obvious that we have no 
claim on God for any other or any different kind of 
evidence. The particular testimonies will be given 
when we come to treat of the individual books of the 
New Testament. 

The next object will be to show that we have the 
text of the New Testament substantially incorrupt, 
that is, that we not only have the same books of the 
New Testament which the first Christians had, but that 
we read in these books the same things, and only -the 
same things which they read in them. 

We close this chapter with an interesting fact or two 
in respect to the emperor Constantine, having an im- 
portant bearing on this whole subject. Constantine, 
although he did not offer himself for baptism till quite 
at the close of life, had always been, from his first ac- 
quaintance with Christianity, an earnest and delighted 
reader of the New Testament. It had been his cus- 
tom for years in his palace to read every day to his 
household a portion of Scripture, and then himself offer 
prayer, like the good Christian house-fathers of the 
Puritan stock. After the affairs of his empire had 
been established on a sure basis, he wrote to Eusebius 
of Caesarea, to have prepared for him, by the best 
workmen and of the best material, fifty copies of the 
entire Greek Scriptures ; and ordered two of the gov- 
ernment wagons, under the special charge of a deacon 
of the Caesarean church, to transport these copies, when 
completed, to Constantinople for his own inspection. 



56 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE, 

This commission Eusebius promptly and joyfully ful- 
filled ; and to this fact undoubtedly, in a great degree, 
we are indebted for the remarkable accuracy of the 
text of the Greek Testament, so much superior in this 
respect to the text of any Greek or Latin classic, or 
even of our own Shakespeare and Milton. These 
manuscripts the emperor gave to the principal churches 
to be read in the public worship ; and they were trans- 
scribed for the use of other churches. To this source 
we probably owe all our best ancient manuscripts of 
the Greek Testament ; the Alexandrian, the Yatican, 
the Ephraim, the Sinai ; which all give evidence of 
Egyptian origin, and of being originally from the great 
book market of Alexandria. See Life of Constantine 
by Eusebius, IV. 17, 34-37. 



CHAPTER THIRD 



EVIDENCE OX WHICH WE RECEIVE THE PRESENT TEXT OF 
THE NEW TESTAMENT AS SUBSTANTIALLY CORRECT. 

To ascertain the substantial correctness of our pres- 
ent text of the New Testament, we must compare 
the readings of our modern printed editions of the 
Greek with the earliest manuscript authorities, and as 
nearly as possible with the very autographs of the 
original authors. It is not ' necessary that we should 
have these autographs, because it is not necessary to 
prove a minute, unchangeable accuracy of every word 
and every letter, but only to show that there has been 
no change which essentially affects the meaning of the 
New Testament, or hinders the attainment of the pur- 
pose for which it was given to mankind. 

In the age of the New Testament writers, the most 
common and convenient material of writing was papy- 
rus — a sort of paper formed of the inner bark of a 
reed which abounds in Egypt, and nourishes also on 
the banks of the Tigris and Euphrates. Of this there 
were three kinds, the sacred, the common, and the 
epistolary. The first was very expensive, and its use 
limited principally to the pagan priesthood in Egypt. 
The epistolary was thin and perishable ; but the com- 
mon papyrus was more firm and durable, and this 
probably was the kind used mainly by the writers of 



58 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

the New Testament. Paul in one passage speaks of 
parchment, and in a manner which indicates that he 
set a high value upon it (II Tim. iv. 13). 

Authors, at that period, seldom committed their own 
compositions to writing, and never for the use of the 
public. The preparation of manuscripts was then a 
trade, as much as printing and bookbinding are now. 
Paul usually did not write even his own epistles (Rom. 
xvi. 22 ; Gal. vi. 11) ; but to prevent forgery he wrote 
his own name with the concluding salutation (I Cor. 
xvi. 21 ; II Thess. iii. 17; Col. iv. 18). He urges it 
as a strong proof of his tender and deep interest in 
the Galatians, that he had written to them so large an 
epistle with his own hand, though the epistle itself is 
much shorter than that to the Romans, which was 
written by Tertius ; and to the Thessalonians he writes, 
" the salutation of Paul with mine own hand, which is 
the token in every epistle; so I write.' 

The author dictated to one whose business it was to 
write rapidly, and who was denominated by the Greeks 
tachugraphos, swift writer, and by the Latins notarius 
or amanuensis. This was copied in a fair character 
by the kalligraplios, fine writer, called also bibliographos, 
and by the Latins, librarius. The manuscript was then 
submitted to one, the dokimazon, whose business it was 
to see whether the whole was accurately written, and to 
correct any errors which might have occurred. 

The work thus prepared was dedicated to some pat- 
ron of learning or of the author, as Josephus directed 
his writings to Epaphroditus, and Luke his to Theoph- 
ilus; or to some association, as the epistles of Paul 
were generally directed to a church ; or to some friend, 



MSS. OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. 59 

as Paul wrote to Timothy, to Titus, and to Philemon ; 
and through these channels they were made known to 
the public (Compare Hug's Introduction to the New 
Testament, vol. I. p. 106 ff. in German). 

All the ancient manuscripts of the New Testament 
of any value, which we now possess, are written on 
parchment or vellum. 

For evidence that we have the text of the New Tes- 
tament as it was originally given, we must first apply 
to the most ancient manuscripts of those books which 
are still accessible. Of these the number, antiquity 
and variety is most surprising, considering the circum- 
stances, and especially when we compare them with 
the paucity and comparative recentness of those on 
which we must rely for the text of the most celebrated 
and most useful writers of classic antiquity. 

Herodotus is the most ancient, and in many respects 
the most important of the classic historians. Of his 
great work there are known to critics in all about fif- 
teen manuscript copies, but most of these are of more 
recent date than A. D. 1450. One of the best, in the 
imperial library at Paris, belongs to the twelfth cen- 
tury, another in the library at Florence, is as early as 
the tenth, and one in the library of Emmanuel College, 
at Cambridge, in England, may be as early as the ninth 
century. Of the ethical writers among the classics, Plato 
is the most celebrated and the most popular. The 
number of the ancient manuscript copies of his wri- 
tings is even fewer than of those of Herodotus, and one 
of the earliest, which is in the Bodleian library at Ox- 
ford, is as recent as the ninth century. This manu- 
script bears the date of A. D. 895 r and was obtained 



GO THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

in the year 1801, by the traveller E. D. Clarke, from 
the Convent of St. John, in the Isle of Patmos. In 
1847 Mr. Coxe, the librarian of the Bodleian, visited 
this convent for the purpose of making . manuscript 
purchases ; but found the monks there still very sore 
on account of the loss of their Plato, which they knew 
very well had gone to Oxford ; and he had very little 
success among them. Now let us compare with this 
statement the antiquity, number and variety of the 
manuscript copies which we have of the historical and 
ethical writers of the New Testament. Of the manu- 
script copies of the Greek Testament, from 700 to 
1000 of all kinds have been examined already by 
critics, and of these at least 50 are more than 1000 
years old, and some are known to be at least 1500 
years old ; while the oldest of the Greek classics 
scarcely reach the antiquity of 900 years, and of these 
the number is very small indeed, compared with those 
of the Greek Testament. We have manuscripts of 
the Greek Testament that could have been read by 
men who had opportunity to read the autographs of 
the apostles themselves; manuscripts as near to the 
life time of the apostles as we ourselves are to the life 
time of the pilgrim fathers who landed at Plymouth ; 
and the writers of which might have themselves seen 
the autograph books in the churches as we now may 
see the original records of the old colony in the Ply- 
mouth court-house. 

When I was in England, in 1836, I saw Dr. Routh, 
the President of Magdalen College, Oxford, who had 
seen and conversed with men who had. seen and con- 
versed with James II. king of England. James died 



MSS. OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. 61 

in 1701, Routh was born in 1 746 ; forty-five years be- 
tween them. I was then only one link distant, in the 
chain of tradition, from the hiding of the Connecticut 
charter in the Wyllys oak in Hartford. 

Any person who saw Josiah Quincy, in Boston, just 
before he died, in 1865, was only two links in the chain 
of tradition from the very first settlement of Massachu- 
setts. S. Bradstreet, governor, was born 1603, died 
1697. J. Quincy was born 1772; seventy-five years 
between them. 

It is about 200 years from the death of the apostle 
John to the first full manuscript we have of the whole 
New Testament, though we have fragments and quota- 
tions from the very earliest periods, from the time of 
the apostle John himself. 

The age of manuscripts to which no date is affixed 
is decided by various circumstances, such as the ap- 
pearance of the parchment, the fashion of the book, 
and particularly the form of the letters used, which 
varied at different periods, as has been the case with 
the types which are used in printed books. Compare 
the books which were printed in London in the time 
of Elizabeth, with those which are printed there now; 
and remember that in manuscript letters the difference 
is still wider at the different periods, as great indeed 
as the difference between German text and the com- 
mon Roman letter ; or, to make a comparison that is 
still more exact, like the difference between the capital 
and the small letters of our common alphabets. In 
respect to antiquity the manuscripts of the Greek Tes- 
tament are of two kinds, designated by the shape of 
the letters in which they are written. The most 
ancient are written in large, square capital letters, 



62 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

without any division into sentence, or even words, con- 
sisting simply of continuous rows of letters across the 
page in parallel lines from the top to the bottom. 
There are, however, certain breaks in the continuity 
of the writing, corresponding in some degree to the 
breaks in the sense, in most if not all the manuscripts ; 
but of these each manuscript, as a general fact, has a 
series peculiar to itself, and none of them have the 
regularity or uniformity of our present arrangement 
into paragraphs and sentences. There are also, com- 
mon to many ancient manuscripts, two sets of divisions, 
the one called the Ammonian sections, introduced by 
Ammonius of Alexandria, in the third century, and 
the other the Eusebian canons, introduced by the ever 
active and indefatigable Eusebius of Caesarea, a cen- 
tury later. These are generally found together ; and 
in manuscripts, too, which have another and more 
ancient division like that which we mentioned first. 
These latter sections and canons, however, are usually 
indicated by Greek numerals, rather than by breaks in 
the writing ; having been often affixed by later hands, 
long after the manuscript had been originally written. 
The letters in which these most ancient manuscripts 
are written, are called uncial letters, from the Latin 
word meaning inch, as if the letters were originally an 
inch long. This letter fell into disuse before the tenth 
century, and manuscripts written in it are older 
than that date. The other kind of letter is called the 
cursive, or running hand, which is a small letter in 
distinction from the capital, and resembles the type in 
which Greek books have generally been printed. We 
may therefore say, as a general classification sufficiently 



MSS. OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. 63 

accurate for our present purpose, that uncial manu- 
scripts of the Greek Testament are more than one 
thousand years old, and the cursive less than a thou- 
sand years. 

The manuscripts of the Greek Testament which we 
have, are all in the book form, none of them in the 
ancient oriental form of rolls. Very few manuscripts 
contain the whole of the New Testament ; for an 
ancient manuscript book being necessarily much larger 
than a printed one, for convenience sake, the Testa- 
ment was generally arranged in four or five different 
volumes. Of the volume containing the Gospels we 
have at least 426 different manuscripts of which 27 
are uncials, or more than one thousand years old ; of 
the volume containing Paul's Epistles, 255 manuscripts, 
of which 9 are uncial ; of the volume of Acts and the 
Catholic Epistles, 200, of which 8 are uncial ; and of 
the Apocalypse or Revelation, 91, of which 3 are 
uncial. Here then we have 972 entire manuscripts of 
the different volumes of the Greek Testament, of which 
47 are more than 1000 years old. This enumeration 
does not include all the known manuscripts, nor are all 
the volumes arranged precisely like these — but I give 
these facts simply as a general illustration of the topic 
under discussion. 

Compare with this what has already been said of the 
number and antiquity of the manuscripts of Herodotus 
and Plato, which are fair specimens of the classics gen- 
erally in regard to this point. Of these two most im- 
portant of the classical writers we have less than 30 
manuscripts, and not one of these 1000 years old; 
while of the New Testament we have in round num- 



64 THE BOOKS OF THE B' t BLE. 

bers 1000 manuscripts, and 50 of them more than 1000 
years old- 
Different books of the New Testament are often in 
manuscripts entirely independent of the other books ; 
and some books were much more frequently copied 
and more generally used than others. There are more 
manuscripts of the Gospels than of any other part of 
the New Testament, and Revelation has by far the 
smallest number. 

A few of the more important of these manuscripts 
will now be described, that the reader may have the 
means of forming a judgment for himself as to their 
condition and value. We will select mainly from those 
which originally contained the whole of the New Tes- 
tament, which are very few in comparison with the 
whole number. When critics first began to use manu- 
scripts for the correction of the printed text, there 
were scarcely a half dozen valuable ones known to 
exist in the libraries of Europe, and for convenience, 
they were designated by the capital letters of the Ro- 
man alphabet, A, B, C, &c, the manuscript first used 
being designated by the first letter, without reference 
to its age or value, and so of the rest in succession. 
The number of manuscripts discovered is now so great 
that all the capitals of both the Roman and Greek 
alphabets have been exhausted in the designation of the 
uncial manuscripts only, and a beginning has been 
made on the Hebrew. As a single manuscript seldom 
contains the whole of the New Testament, but only a 
certain portion of it, it often happens that the same 
letter designates two or three different manuscripts 
when applied to different parts of the Testament. For 



MSS. OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. 65 

example, the letter E may designate a particular man- 
uscript of the Gospels, also a manuscript of Paul's 
Epistles, which has no connection with that of the Gos- 
pels, and so of the rest. This must always be borne 
in mind when examining the references to manuscripts. 
Whenever a manuscript contains the whole of the New 
Testament, the particular letter applied to that is never 
appropriated to any other. The term generally used 
to designate a manuscript book is the Latin word codex. 
A. Codex Alexandrinus. The Alexandrian manu- 
script is so called from the place of its origin, the city 
of Alexandria in Egypt. In the year 1628 Cyril Lu- 
car, patriarch of Constantinople, who formerly held 
the same office at Alexandria in Egypt, and who was 
so much inclined towards protestantism that he made 
an abortive attempt to reform the Greek church on the 
model of Calvinism at Geneva, sent to England by Sir 
Thomas Roe, the English embassador in Turkey, a 
magnificent Greek manuscript of the whole Bible as a 
present to King Charles I. This was kept in the king's 
library till 1753, when on the formation of the British 
Museum, it was transferred to that institution, in the 
archives of which it is still most carefully preserved. 
It has on the back of the first leaf, after the table of 
contents, a statement in Arabic, of a very ancient date, 
that the whole book was written by a noble Egyptian 
lady, and martyr, by the name of Thecla, about the 
time of the council of Nice, which was held A. D. 325. 
The patriarch Cyril, in the same volume, under his 
own hand, certifies to the same fact. There is no evi- 
dence of a date much later than this. Whether we 
admit the accuracy of the tradition or not, we may 
5 



66 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

not safely place the date of the book far on either side 
of A. D. 350. It was probably manufactured at Alex- 
andria in Egypt, the great book mart of that -period. 
The manuscript is on parchment, in quarto form, about 
thirteen inches high and ten broad, each page being 
divided into two columns of fifty lines each, and about 
twenty letters in a line, the lines being simply straight 
rows of uncial (capital) letters, and generally without 
any divisions whatever, even so much as to separate the 
words. Some sections are designated by large orna- 
mented letters, not at the beginning of the section, unless 
the section itself begins with the line, which is seldom 
the case, but at the beginning of the next line below. 
Whenever the section begins after the beginning of a 
line, the first letter of the next line, even though it may 
be in the middle of a word, is a large ornamented capital 
standing out in the margin. The whole is written in 
a plain, square and firm hand, and looks as if it were 
the work of one person throughout. If so it must 
have been a prodigious labor. It is now put up in 
four volumes, three for the Old Testament and 'the 
Apocrypha, and one for the New, with the Epistle of 
Clement to the Corinthians. Several leaves have been 
lost, but the most serious defect is in the first twenty- 
four chapters of Matthew, which are gone beyond 
recovery. There are not a few literal and verbal 
errors in it, very obvious to any intelligent reader, but 
no more than what we might expect in any manuscript 
of that extent, even the most carefully written. It 
has no punctuation or accents, though in some cases 
the end of a word is designated by a small mark. It 
has brief titles and subscriptions to the several books. 



MSS. OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. 67 

In the Gospels it arranges Matthew in 68 sections or 
chapters, Mark 48, Luke 83, and John 18 ; and it has 
also the Eusebian canons, which with the Ammonian sec- 
tions, are intended to make out a harmony of the Gos- 
pel history. It is one of the most valuable, though 
probably not the oldest, of the existing manuscripts 
of the Greek Testament, and from its history and its 
present location we may properly designate it as the 
Greek text of the Protestant church. There was a 
reprint of the New Testament portion published by 
Dr. Woide, in 1786, in large square capitals, intended 
to answer the purpose of a fac simile ; and another 
one in common Greek type by Mr. Cowper, in 1860, 
either of them sufficiently accurate for common crit- 
ical examination. It is difficult and expensive for 
most readers to get access to these very old manu- 
scripts, and when access is attained they are so tender 
and mouldering by reason of age, that they must be 
handled with great caution. An accurate reprint, 
to the reader, after he has once seen the manuscript, 
is more convenient for his purposes, on his own study 
table, than the manuscript itself in its sacred shrine. 

B. Codex Vaticanus, the Vatican manuscript, so 
called from the library in which it is kept, the Vatican 
at Rome. This library was established by pope Nich- 
olas V., about A. D. 1450, and this celebrated manu- 
script has from the first been one of its most valued 
deposits. Little is known of its previous history, 
though it is supposed that it was brought to Italy by 
the learned Greek Cardinal Bessarion in the early part 
of the fifteenth century. It is perhaps a quarter or a 
half century older than the Alexandrian ; and like that 



68 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

it originally contained the whole of the Greek Bible ; 
and like that, too, several of its leaves have been lost. 
The Epistles to Philemon, Titus, and the two to Timo- 
thy, called the pastoral epistles, the latter part of the 
Epistle to the Hebrews, and the Apocalypse, are all 
wanting. The New Testament is now a quarto vol- 
ume, bound in red morocco, ten and a half inches high, 
ten inches broad, and four and a half thick, and con- 
tains 146 leaves. It is written on very fine vellum, in 
a small, elegant square letter, three columns on a page, 
so that on opening the volume anywhere in the New 
Testament, six columns of well formed letters are pre- 
sented to the eye. Each column for the most part 
contains forty-two lines, and each line sixteen or eight- 
een letters. The letters are very much like those in 
the manuscript rolls discovered in the ruins of Hercu- 
laneum, one of the evidences of its great antiquity. 
As originally written it had neither ornamented capi- 
tal letters, punctuation, accents, or anything of the 
kind, though some have been added by later hands 
the earliest perhaps dating from the eighth century. 
The dates of such additions to, or modifications of, 
ancient manuscripts, are ascertained by the color of the 
ink, the forms of the letters, the difference in the hand- 
writing, and other circumstances of the like nature. 
Like all ancient manuscripts, it has no divisions into 
words, though some of the books have divisions into 
sections, marked by blank spaces, Matthew having of 
these sections 170, Mark 72, Luke 152, John 80. It 
has also brief titles and subscriptions to most of the 
J)ooks. 

Its value as an authority is very high, and before 



MSS. OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. 69 

the beginning of the present century it had been three 
times collated, though imperfectly, for printed editions 
of the Greek Testament. The unreasoning jealousy 
of the Papal Court has never allowed to scholars the . 
free use of it. In 1810 Napoleon took it to Paris with 
other Italian treasures, and while there it was easily 
accessible to those who wished to examine it. After 
the battle of Waterloo the spoils were restored to their 
original places ; but Mr. Baber, the librarian of the 
British Museum, besought the Duke of Wellington that 
for the sake of Biblical science this invaluable manu- 
script might be deposited where it would be accessible 
to scholars. " No (says Wellington) I shall not detain 
it ; it is stolen property, and must go back to its own- 
ers." So it went back to the Vatican, where it has 
been guarded with a jealousy so puerile and senseless 
as to deprive the world of the benefits it might confer. 
In 1843, Tischendorf, the best and most careful scholar, 
in this department, of the present generation, went to 
Rome for the purpose of examining it. It was locked 
up in a drawer of the library, and it was some months 
before he could obtain even a sight of it ; and then 
with two prelati to watch him, he was allowed to look 
at it on two separate days, three hours each day ; but 
he was previously searched and deprived of pen, ink 
and paper, to preclude the possibility of making a note, 
and if he even looked at a text with special care, the 
attendants would snatch the book from his hand. In 
1844 Edward de Muralt was allowed to examine it on 
three different days, three hours each day, but under 
the same jealous watchfulness. In 1855 Dr. Tregelles 
went from England to Rome, armed with a letter of 



70 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

recommendation from Cardinal Wiseman, for the ex- 
press purpose of examining the manuscript ; but 
though he was allowed to see it, he was effectually 
hindered from transcribing a syllable. If the Papal 
scholars themselves would make any effective use of 
this treasure committed to their keeping, their exclu- 
sion of all Protestant scholars from it would not appear 
so disgustingly illiberal; but their conduct in this 
respect is a repetition of the old fable of the dog in the 
manger. For more than a quarter of a century, Car- 
dinal Angelo Mai, a really amiable and learned man, 
kept promising a reprint of this work in such a form 
as would meet the demands of Biblical inquiry. In 
1858, the work was published, three years after the 
Cardinal's death ; but so slovenly and unscholar-like was 
the whole performance, that even the Papists were 
ashamed of it, and in 1859 Charles Vercellone, a monk 
of St. Barnabas, and a friend of the Cardinal, pub- 
lished a revised edition, a little better than the first 
one, but still glaringly insufficient, and altogether be- 
low the scholarship of the age. Instead of an exact 
reprint of the Yatican manuscript, word for word and 
letter for letter, which is the thing and the only thing 
that is wanted, and one would think the simplest 
and easiest thing to be done, we have an ordinary 
Greek text on the basis of the Yatican, containing in 
their regular order all the parts which the manuscript 
omits as well as those which it has, and the deviations 
pointed out in marginal notes, which are none of the 
clearest, and all done in such a way as very much to 
diminish our confidence in the accuracy of the whole 
performance. This is the more remarkable, inasmuch 



MSS. OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. 71 

as both the cardinal, and his friend the monk, by their 
prefaces and dissertations, show clearly that they knew 
how the work ought to be done, and that they were 
themselves capable of doing it. We still wait for a 
proper examination and reprint of the Vatican manu- 
script ; and till we can get it, must content ourselves 
with the Greek Testament edited by P. Buttmann, on 
the basis of the Vatican, so far as known, and pub- 
lished at Berlin in 1862. 

The following announcement in the " Nation " news- 
paper, which has been made since the above was writ- 
ten, indicates a most gratifying change of the papal 
policy in regard to the custody of this most precious 
manuscript : 

" Messrs. Williams & Norgate announce a new edi- 
tion — or rather the first genuine edition, for that of 
Cardinal Mai was inaccurate and doctored — of the 
Greek text of the New Testament from the Codex 
Vaticanus. It is edited by Prof. Tischendorf, who 
spent last spring in Borne to examine the manuscript, 
and will be a companion volume to the quarto edition 
of the Codex Sinaiticus. It will give the true text of 
the manuscript, indicating throughout the pages and 
columns of the original, and in some parts the single 
lines. The later alterations, which have been so often 
confounded with the original text, will be for the first 
time distinguished not only from the text but from a 
third writing, later by several centuries. The book 
will also contain valuable prolegomena : on the history 
of the Codex, on its paleographic and other peculiari- 
ties, on the corrections, on the date of its execution, 
and on the character of the text. Prof. Tischendorf 



72 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

makes an extended and careful comparison of the 
Codex Vaticanus with the Codex Sinaiticus, with very 
remarkable results as to the relation of these two im- 
portant manuscripts. A companion volume is also 
announced, under the title of an 'Appendix,' which 
will contain two more leaves of the Codex Sinaiticus, 
in fac-simile, being fragments of the Pentateuch found 
in the covers of old bindings in the monastery of Mt. 
Sinai; nineteen three column pages of the Codex 
Yaticanus, taken from fifteen books of the New Testa- 
ment, and a double column of the poetical books of 
the Old Testament, in fac-simile ; and the complete text 
of the letters of Clemens Homanus, from the Codex 
Alexandrinus in the British Museum, which has never 
been accurately edited. The two volumes will appear 
early in 1867." 

Codex Sinaiticus, the Sinai manuscript, so called 
from the place where it was discovered. In 1844 Dr. 
Tischendorf, while traveling under the patronage of 
the king of Saxony, for research in Biblical science, 
was at the convent of St. Catharine on Mount Sinai. 
From a basket of rubbish intended to kindle his fire 
he picked out forty-three beautiful parchment leaves 
belonging to a manuscript of the Septuagint hitherto 
unknown. These, on his return to Europe, he pub- 
lished. On the 4th of February, 1859, he was at 
the same convent for the third time, and one of the 
monks brought to him the other leaves of that same 
manuscript loosely tied in a napkin. To his inexpres- 
sible delight he found here not only the remaining 
portions of the Septuagint, but also the entire New 
Testament with the Epistle of Barnabas, and portions 




CONVENT OF ST. C A T H A K 1 N E, MOUNT SINAI 



MSS. OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. 73 

of the Shepherd of Hermas ; the most complete, the 
most ancient, the best manuscript copy of the entire 
New Testament that had as yet been known. There 
was no sleep for him that night. Till morning dawn 
he was busy in transcribing, and he persuaded the 
monks to allow him to take the manuscript with him 
to Cairo in Egypt, and finally to St. Petersburg in 
Europe, as a present to the Russian emperor Alexan- 
der II., the great patron of the Greek church through- 
out the world. 

The New Testament part of this manuscript, with 
Barnabas and Hermas, consists of one hundred and 
forty-seven and a half leaves of excellent parchment, 
written four columns on a page, forty-eight lines in 
each column, and on an average fifteen letters in a line, 
in a large, plain, square letter, clearly and symmetri- 
cally formed. There are revisions and would-be cor- 
rections of the manuscript by later hands, beginning 
as early as the sixth century ; but as it came from the 
hand of the first writer, there was no punctuation, no 
division of sentences or words, no accents, no orna- 
mented capitals; everything plain about it, indicating 
great carefulness and the highest antiquity. There is 
nothing improbable in the supposition that it may be 
one of the very manuscripts which Eusebius, by the 
order of Constantine, had prepared at Alexandria for 
the use of the metropolitan churches. It is the only 
ancient manuscript yet known which contains the 
Greek text entire without the loss of a leaf. The em- 
peror Alexander had two hundred copies of an exact 
fac-simile prepared, which he presented to different 
learned institutions throughout Christendom, and Tisch- 



74 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

endorf has. published a beautiful and accurate reprint 
in common Greek type (Leipsic, 1863), which is a per- 
fect model for a publication of this kind. When shall 
we have such a reprint of the Vatican manuscript? 
Even in this most precious Sinai document there are 
just such verbal and literal errors as we might natu- 
rally expect in such a work ; but most of them are very 
easily detected. The Greek and Roman capital letters 
having been exhausted in designating manuscripts 
before Tischendorf discovered this one, he refers to it 
by the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet, aleph. 

I have called these three important manuscripts, to 
wit, the Alexandrian, the Vatican and the Sinai, re- 
spectively the Greek Testament of the Protestant, the 
Roman, and the Greek churches, merely on account of 
their history and location ; and not because any one 
of these three great divisions of Christendom finds 
special help in regard to their peculiarities, from any 
of these manuscripts. These three great original 
sources of New Testament teaching, with the utmost 
impartiality treat all these divisions exactly alike, so 
far as their denominational character is concerned, that 
is, they say nothing about them whatever ; and they 
all three are decidedly and equally the upholders of 
Protestantism, just so far as Protestantism, in fidelity 
to its original principles, rejects the mere human tradi- 
tions, which encumber and overlie the Greek and 
Roman confessions, and adheres simply to the teach- 
ings of Christ and the apostles as expressed in the 
written word. 

To give the reader an idea of the different kinds 
of uncial manuscripts of the Greek Testament it will 
be necessary to present a brief description of two 



MSS. OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. 75 

others, differing from the three just described in im- 
portant points, to wit, those referred to by critics by 
the letters C and D. 

C. Codex Ephraemi, the Ephraim manuscript, so 
called from Ephraim the Syrian, a Mesopotamian saint 
of the age of Constantine. This is a very valuable 
manuscript of the same class with the Alexandrian as 
to age, form of letters, etc. It originally contained 
the whole of the Greek Bible, written in a single col- 
umn to a page, with from forty to forty -five lines in a 
column, and from forty to forty-five letters to a line. 
Somewhere in the twelfth century this manuscript was 
taken to pieces, the letters as far as possible obliter- 
ated, and the leaves used for a copy of the Greek ser- 
mons of St. Ephraim. For this purpose the leaves 
were taken promiscuously without any regard to their 
proper original order and sewed together at hap-hazard, 
sometimes top end down, and front side behind, just 
as if they had been mere blanks, the sermons of Eph- 
raim being the only matter regarded in the book. 
These sermons formed a thin quarto volume, morocco 
bound, and the parchment on which they were written 
contained sixty-four leaves of the Greek Old Testa- 
ment, and one hundred and forty -five of the New ; of 
entire books of the New Testament, only John II. and 
Thess. II. are wholly missing, and there are also want- 
ing in the four Gospels about thirty-seven chapters, in 
the Acts ten, in the Epistles forty-two, and in the Reve- 
lation eight. 

The volume was brought to France from Italy by 
Catharine de Medicis as the sermons of Ephraim, it 
not having been at that time discovered that the parch- 



76 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

ment originally was used for a copy of the Scriptures. 
This was first satisfactorily ascertained by Peter Allix 
about 1650 ; and in 1834, a*t the instance of the scholar 
Fleck, a chemical wash was applied to the pages, which, 
without putting Ephraim into the dark, made the evan- 
gelists and apostles somewhat visible. The precious 
remains were published in an accurate reprint by Tisch- 
endorf, A. D. 1843. It is probably somewhat later 
than the Alexandrian, but of great critical value. 
There are in it some breaks for sections, but no division 
of words, no traces of chapters except in the Gospels, 
where we have the Ammonian divisions marked by 
large letters ; and the titles and subscriptions to the 
books are very brief and simple. The leaves have been 
much discolored by the wash applied to them, and 
they are so tender and mouldering by reason of age 
that the scholar will find Tischendorf 's reprint much 
more convenient for use than the manuscript itself. 
Manuscripts of this kind, where one writing has been 
erased to make room for another, are called palimpsests, 
from two Greek words which signify to wipe again. This 
manuscript, like the others, has been subjected to the 
revisions of correcters, the earliest of whom seems to 
be of about the sixth century. This most interesting 
relic of antiquity, was, after some hesitation, put into 
my hands by the very gentlemanly and accommoda- 
ting librarian of the Imperial Library at Paris, with the 
remark that it was so old and fragile, and so much in- 
jured by the chemical wash, as to require the most 
delicate handling, and that the last person who had 
been permitted to examine it was the eminent German 
scholar Dr. Tischendorf, the discoverer of the Sinai 
manuscript. 



MSS. OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. 77 

D. Codex Bezae, the Beza manuscript, presented 
to the library of the University of Cambridge in Eng- 
land, by Theodore Beza, A. D. 1581. This is a hand- 
some quarto manuscript on parchment of a good qual- 
ity, carefully written in stichoi, that is, lines not filling 
the page, but as we print poetry, in a single column, 
the Greek on the left hand page and a very ancient 
Latin translation on the right, corresponding line for 
line and almost word for word with the Greek ; and the 
uncial letter of both languages so much alike that on 
first opening the volume both pages present themselves 
to the eye as Greek. The book is ten inches high by 
eight broad, and consists of four hundred and fourteen 
leaves, eleven of which are mutilated, and nine, addi- 
tions by later hands. Beza obtained it in 1552 from 
the monastery of St. Irenaeus, in Lyons, where it had 
long lain buried in dust ; and the heads of the Cam- 
bridge University, in acknowledging the present, assure 
the donor that next to the Sacred Scriptures them- 
selves there are no books which they prefer to the 
writings of the famous John Calvin and his friend 
Theodore Beza. It contains only the historical books 
of the New Testament; and in a text that is very 
peculiar, more divergent from the common text than 
any other ancient manuscript, and it belongs probably 
to the latter part of the fifth century, A. D. 490, or 
thereabouts, being the most modern of the five which 
we have described. A good reprint of it was pub- 
lished by Dr. Kipling, two vols, folio in 1793, which is 
nearly & facsimile. 

Nothing is known of its early history, but probably 
it was copied from some old Alexandrian manuscript, 



78 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

and the Latin translation inserted for the benefit of 
the western churches. 

In the summer of 1836 I had the free use of this 
beautiful and interesting book through the politeness 
of Rev. Dr. Lamb, a younger brother of the Prime 
Minister Lord Melbourne, and then master of Corpus 
Christi College. Dr. Lamb was an eminent scholar 
in manuscript and antiquarian lore, as is fully shown 
by his splendid work on the Thirty -nine Articles. 

These five will give the reader a very good idea of 
the general character, condition, and variety of our 
most ancient manuscript copies of the Greek Testa- 
ment. 

Here then we have accessible to us five manuscript 
copies of the Greek Testament, the most recent more 
than 1200 years old, and the most ancient reaching to 
an age of fifteen centuries. The proudest and most 
costly architectural structures of men have within that 
period either crumbled and mouldered away, or become 
obsolete and unfit for their original use, though built 
of the most solid materials and put together with the 
utmost care ; while we of this age can read the same 
fragile page of books which were in the hands of men 
forty -five and fifty generations before us. 

These all give substantially the same text that we now 
have. There are diversities among them, and diver- 
gencies from our common text ; and these are to be 
frankly acknowledged and their real importance fully 
indicated, without any attempt at concealment or pal- 
liation or apology. No ancient Greek manuscript 
hitherto discovered contains I John v. 7, There are 
three that bear record in heaven, etc. ; in our common 



MSS. OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. 79 

text the verse John i. 18, reads, The only begotten Son 
who is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared 
him, but the old Greek manuscripts read, The only 
begotten God who is in the bosom of the Father, he hath 
declared him; in Colossians ii. 2, our common text 
reads, To the acknowledgment of the mystery of God, 
and of the Father, and of Christ, but the old Greek 
manuscripts read, To the acknoivledgment of the mys- 
tery of the God Christ; and so there are other diver- 
sities between the old text and the present one ; but 
these I think are the most striking examples that can 
be found. Do they in the least degree necessarily 
change or even modify our ideas respecting any Scrip- 
tural fact, doctrine, or precept ? They somewhat dis- 
turb those who hold to the notion of a strictly verbal 
inspiration, and exact verbum verbo dictation, by the 
Holy Spirit in the composition of the Scriptures ; but 
these I suppose are very few in number and not the 
most thoughtful or intelligent. 

Besides these divergencies between the older manu- 
scripts and the modern text, there are also divergen- 
cies among the older manuscripts themselves. The 
best illustration of this can be found by comparing the 
Yatican with the Beza, the most ancient perhaps, cer- 
tainly with only one exception, with the most modern 
of the five which we have described. As compared 
with the common text the Yatican is remarkable for 
its condensations, the Beza for its amplifications. For 
example if the common text should say, Then Jesus 
again went ujp to Jerusalem, it would be characteristic 
for the Yatican to express itself thus : Jesus went to 
Jerusalem. As already shown the Yatican has not yet 



80 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

been examined with sufficient minuteness to speak 
with strict accuracy on this subject ; but critics affirm 
that from examinations already made, more than one 
thousand instances in all the New Testament of such 
condensations are found in the Vatican as compared 
with other texts. Of the Beza manuscript there has 
been the fullest opportunity for examination, and 
therefore we can be quite explicit in our designation 
of the amplifications to be found in it. In Acts xi. 25, 
the common text says of Barnabas, He went to Tarsus 
to seek Saul, and finding him brought him to Antioch. 
The Beza gives it thus : And hearing that Said ivas at 
Tarsus, he went there to seek him j and when he hap 
pened to meet him, he entreated him to come to Antioch. 
In the narrative of Peter's visit to Cornelius, Acts x. 
after verse 24, the Beza manuscript thus particularizes : 
And Peter, drawing near to Caesarea, one of the serv- 
ants running before announced him, and Cornelius run- 
ning out and meeting him, etc. 

Such amplifications, as is readily seen, no more change 
the sense or import of the New Testament, than do the 
condensations of the Vatican. But sometimes the 
Beza makes a veritable addition to the common text, 
a new statement, but always in the same line of thought 
and to the same purport. For example, at Luke vi. 5, 
after the conversation in regard to working on the 
Sabbath, the Beza adds : And on the same day, seeing 
a man at work on the Sabbath, he said to him, man, if 
thou knoiuest ivhat thou art doing, blessed art thou / but 
if thou knowest not, thou art accursed and a transgressor 
of the law. 

We must here remark that the Beza is the least reli- 



MSS. OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. 81 

able of the five ancient manuscripts we have selected 
for description, and that being written at a later period 
and for the use of the western churches, it probably- 
incorporated into the text circumstances the memory of 
which had been perpetuated in the East simply by 
tradition. Doubtless the Vatican is much nearer to 
the autographs of the original writers than the Beza. 
Various Readings. From the thousand manuscripts 
(more or less) of the Greek Testament, or parts of the 
Greek Testament, which have already been examined, 
critics have selected about 50,000 various readings. 
But most of them are simple differences of orthogra- 
phy, as if the word labor were spelled in one manu- 
script with the u, and in another without it. Very many 
are simple diversities in the collocation of the words 
— as if one should say, Jesus went to Jerusalem, and 
another, To Jerusalem Jesus went Not 50 of the 
50,000 make any change in the meaning whatever; 
and among these fifty the most important changes are 
such as those which have already been noticed in the 
comparisons made on a preceding page. The uni- 
formity and purity of the text of the Greek Testa- 
ment, when we consider how old a book it is, and for 
how many ages it was propagated only in manuscript 
before the art of printing was known, and when we 
call to mind the vicissitudes of persecution and corrup- 
tion and superstition and unbelief and bigotry and dog- 
matism and latitudinarianism, through which the Chris- 
tian churches have passed in that time, — is perfectly 
amazing, and beyond that of any other book in the 
world of frequent publication and wide extent. Mil- 
ton and Bunyan and Shakespeare, though scarcely more 
6 



82 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

than two centuries old, and always having the advan- 
tages of type and printing, open a much wider field 
for various readings than any part of the Greek Tes- 
tament, the latest book of which has been in existence 
more than seventeen centuries. On this subject I can 
not do better than quote the following from the North 
American Review in an article on Prof. Norton's work 
on the New Testament. 

"It seems strange that the text of Shakespeare, 
which has been in existence less than two hundred and 
fifty years, should be far more uncertain and corrupt 
than that of the New Testament, now over eighteen 
centuries old, during nearly fifteen of which it existed 
only in manuscript. The industry of collators and 
commentators indeed has collected a formidably array 
of ' various readings ' in the Greek text of the Scrip- 
tures, but the number of those which have any good 
claim to be received, and which also seriously affect 
the sense, is so small that they may almost be counted 
upon the fingers. With perhaps a dozen or twenty 
exceptions, the text of every verse in the New Testa- 
ment may be said to be so far settled by the general 
consent of scholars, that any dispute as to its meaning 
must relate rather to the interpretation of the words, 
than to any doubts respecting the words themselves. 
But in every one of Shakespears thirty-seven plays, 
there are probably a hundred readings still in dispute, 
a large proportion of which materially affect the mean- 
ing of the passages in which they occur." It may be 
added that it is perfectly understood among scholars, 
that no one doctrine of Scripture of any importance 
and no practical duty, are at all impugned or materially 



MSS. OF THE NEW TESTAMENT, 83 

affected by these " various readings." Nineteen-twen- 
tieths of them are of no more importance than the 
question, whether the words labor, honor, &c., should 
be written with or without the additional vowel. 

A stronger case even than that of Shakespeare has 
lately come to the notice of the writer. From a com- 
parison of the manuscript of Edwards' Work on the 
Will, published within the last century under the super- 
intendence of his own descendants, it may be made 
apparent that the text is more at variance with the 
original and more open to objections of this character 
than our authorized version itself. 

The first printed edition of the Greek Testament 
that was ever published, was issued from the press of 
John Frobenius in Basel, in March 1516. It con- 
tained both the Greek and Latin text, together with 
annotations, and was hastily and rather carelessly pre- 
pared by Erasmus. In subsequent editions it was 
greatly improved. The Greek manuscripts which he 
used are still to be seen in the university library at 
Basel. They are of comparatively recent date, and 
of inferior authority. In his Greek manuscript of the 
Revelation the last six verses were missing, and he 
supplied the defect as well as he could by himself trans- 
lating these verses from the Yulgate Latin into Greek. 
Cardinal Ximenes had already prepared a better 
edition in Spain from better manuscripts ; but this was 
not published till the year 1522, when it -came out as 
a part of the famous Complutensian Polyglott Bible, the 
greatest work of that great statesman and ecclesiastic. 
Since then, the printed editions of the Greek Testament 
have been almost innumerable ; and by the labors, of 



84 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

such scholars as Wetstein, Griesbach, Lachmann, Tre- 
gelles, and Teschendorf, the text has been brought to 
a degree of accuracy and perfection such as belongs 
to no other ancient book that was ever printed. Any 
objection to the New Testament on the ground that 
its present text is uncertain must proceed either from 
the most deplorable ignorance in regard to such mat- 
ters, or from a spirit of the most hopeless cavilling. 

Our present division into chapters and verses is com- 
paratively modern, the chapters going no farther back 
than the thirteenth century, and the verses being as re- 
cent as the sixteenth. Neither do we claim any divine 
authority for the punctuation or the division into 
words : but among intelligent readers of the original 
there will be found very little occasion for difference 
of opinion on either of these points. 



<*!>' 



ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER THIRD. 

For the following fac-similes I am indebted princi- 
pally to the published writings of Prof. Tischendorf, 
Dr. Hartwell Home, Dr. Christopher Wordsworth, and 
the Rev. Frederick Henry Scrivener. 



ILLUSTRATION A. 

No. 1 is the English of John i. 1-7, printed in square Roman cap- 
itals without any division of words, just like the old Greek manu- 
scripts represented in the following illustrations. It will be found on 
trial that such writings are not so difficult to be read as might at first 
be supposed. 

No. 2 is John xiv. 6, represented in the same way with the Greek 
in a parallel column for the purpose of comparison. 

No. 3. is Matt. i. 18, 19, with the parallel column of Greek. 



&-? 



ILLUSTRATION A 



Inthebeginningwasthewordandthewordwas 
withgdandgdwastheword- 
hewasinthebeginningwithgd 
allweremadebyhimandwith 
outhimwasmadenotoneotzy^ 
thatwasmadeinhimlifewas_ 
andthelifewasthelightofmn 
andthelightindarknessshin 
ethandthedarknessdidnotitcqmpre 
hend- therewasamnse 

Ntfromgod WHOSENAME WAS 
IOHNTHIS CAME 

ASAWITNESSTHATTHEMIGHTTESTI 
FYCONCERNINGTHELIGHTTHATA 
LLMIGHTBELIEYETHROUGHHIM- 



AErEIATTSlOI2 
rSlEIMEIHO 
02KAIHAAH 
IAKAIHZJIH 
YJI2EPXETAT 
P02T07VI1TPA 
IMHJIEMOY 



2. 

SAITHUNTOHIMJs 
IAMTHEW 
AYANDTHETRIT 
THANDTHELIFE 
3STQMANCQMETH 

UNTOTHEFTHr 

BUTBYME 



3. 



ToT4Ei±X lHrENE2I2 O Y 
TSl 2HN-MNH2 TE YSEI 
2H2 TH2MHTP 02 A YTO. . . 
MAPIA2 TSlIfL2H<I>nPIN 
2 YNEA QEINA YTO Y2E Y 
PH9 HENTA2 TPIEX Y2A* 
EKJJN2AriOY 
IJ12H'T>AE0ANHPA YTH2 
JIKAI02SINKAIMHOEA. . . 
A YTHNAEirMA TEI2AI 
EHO YAHQHAA OPAAIIOA Y 
2AIAYTHN. 



nowthebirthofjschtth 

uswas'beingespou 

sedhismother 

marytojosePHbefore 

theycametogethershewas 

found withchild 



bytheholyspt* 
JosePHthenherhusband 
beingajustmanandnotwill . 
tomakeherapublicexample 
wasm ind edprivilytoput 

HERAWAY. 



ILLUSTRATION B. 

This is Luke xxiv. 49-53, in exact fac-simile from the Sinai man- 
uscript. The last two lines are the words euangelion hata loukan, 
the title of the book, as in most of these manuscripts the title is at 
the end instead of the beginning. 

The line at the top of the page is the clause at the close of the 
53d verse, and was carried up into heaven, which was not in the man- 
uscript as originally written, but was added by a later hand. The 
difference in the hand-writing in perfectly obvious, A mark between 
the lines, a little more than half way down the column, shows where 
the correction is to come in. It is to be read in the line below the 
mark. 



si 



B. 



|^XN&^> (rp 6TD6IC TtjHo v'no »n! 
AO>THNen>Tr€Ai 

e <PYMAeYMeic 
AeKAO) CATGeNjH 

noAGiecDcoveN 
aych coecxyf ore 

gxh rAreN KeXfT T c 

e<JJ CHfOCRH 0A 

N I AN km en MA* 

TAC X I P ACAYTOTH 

Y Aorn cgn AyToY* 

ka lereN eToeN 

tcl> e y ao r/ n Air* 

AYTOYCAieCTH 
An AY~TC-L> NKA I AY_ 
TOin fOCKYNHCK 

xecAyTo n yn ec 
Tpe-f ANeiciepoY 

CAAH MM CTKXA 
f AC M € rAAH C KAJ 

HCANAIAnANT" 

e n Tu> i e y oj eyAo 
toy NTe cto n eH 

lYATr«A|«N 

kataayaan" 



ILLUSTRATION C. 

No. 1, John i. 1-7, in exact fac- simile of the Alexandrian manu- 
script. In this extract there is no defect in the writing. 

No. 2, is Rev. i. 1-4, from the same manuscript ; but the first let- 
ters of most of the lines, as shown by the dots, have become obliter- 
ated by the ravages of time. It will be seen, on trial, that such slight 
imperfections do not at all obscure the sense in reading. 



<?/ 



f 



c. 

1 



S ©I^TWWN^OrOCKMOXOro»« 
2, TirbcfONSRWCkteCHNOAOTQC 

7 O^GHNeNi^HTrPOOTOHeN 

reicxyTOY6reN6TOOY^.eeN* 
5reroN6Neh4XYTCDZODHHNi* . 

I<MHZODHHNTOd>a)CTa>NXNa3N 

KXlTOd>CDCeHTHCKOTlXC|>Al 

NerKXlHCKbTIXAYTOOYKXTe 

,» ^xxBew ; ereN^roxNOCMie 

C3TAXM6NOCTTXPXeYX)NOM>^y 
TC©ICDXNNHC OYTOCH^eeisI 
e«CMXPTYPI^HiNXMX.fTYpH 
CHTTepiTQyq>flDTOClNJkTr^N 
TeCOTlCT6Yea>GiN^.lXYTOY* 



*«*< 



-' I^xv4?rcm^Hi<^Js:cDr<€WXYT«» 
«««. 2^eix^rT<)io-2vOYA.oicxYTOY^v-8ueir© 
•» •« peAJ6MT>^€f , r<*.iecHMxivjeNX.Tro 

«^€!XXC^JXarOY>JT'exOYX^ 
»• » TCYlCOXhJMH • OCOMA-PTYPHCeKTrOM 
♦♦•r6NTQY©YI<AITyKIMXpTYPtXl>UYXY 
«CXC&J^ ! MM<^pl6c6XM^^ 

•'>J^Aj<oYOhNrTeCTOYC^onoYcrrHC 

^OOHTeiXC*l<XITHPOYMT6CTXeKIJkY 

^THr^TP^kMMQvJX 6rxpi<^.?pocerrYC- 

'CJDXNMMCTXICeiXTrxei<l<AHCfXlCTXl« 
eNTHXCrX XJvpiCYMJNl<AJeifHbJH 



ILLUSTRATION D. 

No. 1, is Psalm i. 1, 2, and the first line of verse 3, in exact fac- 
simile of the Vatican manuscript, exhibiting the mode in which the 
poetical books are there written, in stickois as it is called. 

No. 2, is Ezekiel i. 1-3, from the same manuscript. We are 
obliged here to give our illustration from the Old Testament instead 
of the New, because the stupid jealousy of the Papal court has never 
yet allowed a fac - simile of any part of the New Testament to be 
taken.* The writing however is the same in both parts, and the illus- 
trations above from Psalms and Ezekiel give a very sufficient idea 
of the whole manuscript. 



* By the exertions of Prof. Teschendorf, we have now reason to hope that a 
different policy will hereafter be pursued- 



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D. 



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XX \ ft eH XUJ M om to l<YTOe CA.MM aajytY 
K^l 6N TCJD M dMUJAYTOYH^AGTHCe 

HMe]>ACKAjNTK TO ' C 
kX eCTAlU)CT03Y\ONTOne<j>rT€r 








KAiert^£T06hTCAnrplA 

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WNNIPCMnTHTOYMfl^^ 

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H N CM X9 N C^wHO I O YP AN*M 

k &J 6$ AONop *x ej t ©*rn«^ 
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N6YOAO no CKyn poc !£ 

2eteMKY80N&OY^ €rrW 
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J3&f K^icr€N€"TO€rf€M€ 

xeipKY *** Ao n 8<ai i &«r 

nN&€I,Alp<>NHpX£TOA'!© 
^OppAK^^€<^€2wHM€rA. 
Ah€HKTTU> 



ILLUSTRATION E. 

This is the famous text, 1 Tim. iii. 9-15, in exact fac simile of the 
Ephraem manuscript palimpsest. The pale writing is the New Tes- 
tament passage in Greek, and the bright black lines are a part of one 
of St. Ephraem's sermons in Greek, to provide material for which, 
on account of the dearness of parchment, the New Testament itself 
had been obliterated. It will be seen that there is very little diffi- 
culty in reading the original Greek. 



1< 






£ o \ £ o - o c » 



u 







4 

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ILLUSTRATION F. 

This illustration is designed to exhibit the differences of hand- writing 
in which the various corrections are made from time to time in an- 
cient manuscripts ; and how we are able to detect, by the style of the 
penmanship, the comparative age of each of the corrections. The 
specimens are all from the Sinai manuscript. 

No. 1, is John v. 6-9. 

No. 2, is John vi. 14, 15. 

No. 3, is a correction in Matt. v. 45. 

No. 4, is a correction in Matt. x. 39. 

No. 5, is a correction in 2 Cor. x. 12. 

No. 6, is a correction in Matt. ix. 10. 

No 7, is a correction in Matt. iii. 13, 14. 

No 8, is a correction in Luke xxiv. 51. 

No, 9, is a correction in Matt, xxiii. 35. 



<?7 



F. 

1 

TCDVAATI M O NOB 

AAA 6 NTO) y* ^ T » . 
KAITTCpAJMATlKN 

TOTTNA€CTINTO 

MApTYpOTNOTIT^ 

ONAeCTINHMH 

eeiAOTioiTpei^i 

cinoih^FTTP ^ 
T6CTO n N hK aj Toy 
ACDPKATTOAlMA 

KA|OITF e « ce J c T° 

TYf.i ANTPY^Y*** 1 

2 
HC€NCHM6ION £ A e 

ro Hoy TOcecTiN 
AAHea>conro<J>H _ 

epxoMeNoc 

ICOY NTN OYCOTI 

M gaaoyci Nepx* 

CeXPKAIArnAZelN 
AYTOH l<X 1 A N A Wn*n« 

^<peYneinAAi N^IT 
of oc mo N o cKvT«* 



ILLUSTRATION F— Continued. 

No. 10, is a caligraphic flourish. 

No. 11, is a correction in Rev. xi. 1. 

No. 12, is a correction in Isaiah viii. 22. 

No. 13, is a correction in 1 Tim. iii. 16. 

No. 14, is a correction in Matt. xix. 3. 

No. 15, is a sentence by a certain monk who had been employed 
on the manuscript, or had the use of it, nearly as late as the twelfth 
century. The- meaning is this : Remember, Lord, the soul of the sin- 
ner Dionysius the monk, when thou comest into thy kingdom. Such 
sentences are not uncommon in the ancient Bible manuscripts. They 
form no part of the text, and are simply pious ejaculations of the 
writers or readers. In this instance the ugly, awkward, cramped, 
barbarous hand shows plainly enough a later and barbarous period, 
and contrasts very strongly with the neat, plain and not inelegant 
hand of the original writer of the manuscript. The difference in the 
writing, in each instance, is well worthy of study, and of great interest 
to the investigator. 



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© oy ckki b pexi en k®* 

\A\>^ToieNeAY 
ToicMeTfoyNTec 



KX1 XMApTCDXO] 






ixx^Hcjo yo A€^\ i e 



^ 



M H Xrocz20CApJ-TVy <, r^xioj 

Tdth ceYceBei^xc 
MYCTHfiOKioce 

no NTec e i el ecu'***' ^ 



ILLUSTRATION G. 

This is a fac simile of Acts vii. 2, from the Codex Laudianus, a 
very valuable manuscript of the sixth century, now in the Bodleian 
library at Oxford. The right hand column is the original Greek, 
and the left hand a Latin translation, It will be seen how closely, 
at that period, the Latin and Greek alphabets resembled each other, 
and how very short the lines in which the ancient manuscripts were 
often written. 



G. 



Zy c o O^ ffl*7f c 



C 



en c 

V 

(X) 



to 
Oi 

(A 



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GO 



05 









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o 8 



ILLUSTRATION H, 

This illustration is intended to indicate the transition from the 
square capitals, in which the Greek manuscripts of the New Testa- 
ment were written previous to the tenth century, to the cursive or 
running hand which came into use subsequent to that period, and 
gave form to the Greek type used when printing was introduced. 

No. 1, is the beginning of John's Gospel, i. 1-10, as presented in 
an elegant manuscript of the latter part of the fourteenth century. 
It is called the Codex Ebnerianus, and belongs to the University of 
Oxford. 

No. 2, is Matt. xv. 1, 2, in exact fac simile from an elegant manu- 
script of the Gospels in the city of Basle, as early as the tenth cen- 
tury, and probably among the earliest that were written in the cur- 
sive character. 



Jo3 





y CL£/^H up OjJ>\fy |<J0U O^O \/)C Hp TO-^C 3"p 6p 

|<ou *-Vp */-*Y/ * o*uTb«7\ Hjp £y OLg^NmTr^/Jcr 
T* H H «& "txrapTo) J\"aXiTo J G"*V^^ ^^° £ ,c 

? "^ 5 <f> ^ C ep tth irtLiJ^nTou: <£t*t'p ^ • Kaln <ji*o 



Co /<Lo y xr^La> ^7. /<al p \&c\£ cfj ^Td a g 

2 

Q~JJ £/> **f ,x«*"rca. ou/rtG, fcoLpttFXAO i J^cu fp«.>MA<t^6a 



CHAPTER FOURTH. 

BRIEF BIOGRAPHIES OF ONE HUNDRED OF THE ANCIENT 
WITNESSES TO THE NEW TESTAMENT BOOKS, WHOSE 
TESTIMONY IS MOST IMPORTANT AND MUCH OF IT CITED 
IN THE FOLLOWING PAGES. 

This list includes not only orthodox Christians, but 
also Jews, heretics, pagans, and infidels. Where testi- 
mony from such varied and even opposing sources is 
really coincident and self-consistent, it must be substan* 
tially correct. 

As we have affirmed in chapter second that the tes- 
timony on which the genuineness of the sacred books 
of the New Testament rests, is as good as any human 
testimony whatever on any subject, we proceed now 
to submit to the reader a brief account of the princi- 
pal witnesses. 

Agrtjopa Castor, lived under the emperor Hadrian, 
about A. D. 120. He wrote a work in 29 books 
against Basilides of Alexandria, the Egyptian Gnostic. 
This work was read by Eusebius, and is referred to by 
him in very high terms in E. H. iv. Agrippa was 

highly distinguished as a man of extensive learning, 
and he was confided in as a man of integrity and 
truthfulness. Jerome, Catal Script, c. 20. 

Alexander, Bishop of Alexandria from A. D. 312 to 
326. He took an active part in the controversy 
against Arius and was a member of the Council of 



102 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Nice, A. D. 325. He wrote letters to various bishops 
respecting the Arian controversy. Of these there are 
now extant, one to Alexander, bishop of Byzantium, 
in Theodoret i. 1 ; another to the Catholic bishops 
generally throughout the world, in Socrates i. 6 ; some 
fragments of a letter against the Arians, and a short 
epistle to the elders and deacons of Alexandria in Cot- 
elerius. 

Amelius, named also Gentilianus, born in Tuscany 
in the third century. He was a Platonic philosopher, 
a disciple of Plotinus, and wrote in defence of his 
master. 

Ambrose was born in 333, the son of a Roman 
proconsul in Gaul. He held an office in Milan, and in 
the midst of a fierce controversy for the vacant bish- 
opric there, he, though a mere civilian, was suddenly 
chosen to the dignity by popular acclamation. He ac- 
cepted the appointment with reluctance, but held it 
with great activity and conscientiousness till his death 
in 397. Of his courage and decision in the discharge 
of his official duties he gave a brilliant proof in his 
treatment of the emperor Theodosius, whom he with- 
stood at the door of his church and compelled him to 
submit to the regular church discipline, on account of 
some cruelties of which he had been guilty. The 
feeble attempt of Gibbon to deprive Ambrose of all 
the credit of this daring act of official duty, only shows 
the shallowness of the claims of the infidel historian to 
freedom from partizan bias, on which he so much 
values himself. Ambrose was eminent for his services 
as a writer of hymns and promoter of church music. 
His writings, still extant, are numerous and easily acces- 



THE ONE HUNDRED WITNESSES. 103 

sible. He was a man of great native nobleness of 
character as well as of Christian conscientiousness and 
unshaken intrepidity in the discharge of his Christian 
obligations. 

Ammonites. There are two witnesses of this name. 
One is the celebrated Ammonius Saccas, who gave a 
more definite form to the eclecticism of the new Pla- 
tonists, and was the philosophical teacher of Origen 
about 250. He remained all his life a pagan. 

Co temporary with him there was also a Christian 
Ammonius, whose writings, some of which are still 
extant, are quoted by both Eusebius and Jerome. 
Among these are a treatise on the agreement of Moses 
and Jesus, and a harmony of the Gospels. 

Ampliilochius of Cappadocia, at first a monk and af- 
terwards bishop of Iconium in Lycaonia. He was a 
strenuous opponent of the Arians, and influenced the 
emperor Theodosius to issue an edict against them. 
He was present at the synod of Constantinople in 394. 
He was highly esteemed by Basil the great. Most of 
his writings, which consisted mainly of sermons and bi- 
ographies, are lost ; but one of his poetical works, still 
extant, contains a complete catalogue of the Christian 
writings as they were received in his time. This how- 
ever is by some ascribed to Gregory of Nazianzen. 

Andreas, once bishop of Caesarea in Cappadocia, 
about the year 500, wrote a commentary on the Revela- 
tion which is still extant, and is in many respects a 
work of great interest and importance. 

Appelles, about the year 188, was a disciple of Mar- 
cion, and a fellow student of Lucian. After having 
been excommunicated by Marcion for the alleged crime 



104 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

of unchastity, lie founded a Gnostic sect of his own. 
He is quoted by Ambrose, and notwithstanding his 
rather doubtful moral character, there is no ground 
for the impeachment of his testimony in regard to the 
Sacred Books in use among the Christians of his time. 
He had neither interests nor prejudices, which, so far 
as we can judge, would induce him to give false testi- 
mony on such a subject as this. 

Apollonius. In the first century after Christ, there 
was a pagan of this name, from Tyana in Cappadocia, 
He was said to be a worker of miracles ; he traveled 
extensively as a teacher of morals and religion, and 
his miracles were often claimed to be on a level with 
those of the Lord Jesus. A few of his letters are still 
extant ; and a biography of him principally from the 
writings of Philostratus, was published by the English 
deist Blount, in 1680. 

The Christian Apollonius was a presbyter at Ephesus, 
and an active opponent of Montanus. He lived late 
in the third century, and is quoted by Eusebius. 

Archelaus, a bishop in Mesopotamia, about the year 
277, and one of the first opponents of the sect of the 
Manicheans. 

Aretas, archbishop of Caesarea in Cappadocia, about 
540, the author of a commentary on Revelation which 
is still extant. 

Arius, the much celebrated founder of the sect of 
Axians, was the son of Ammonius, from Lybia or Alex- 
andria, and a contemporary of Constantine. He was 
presbyter at Alexandria, under the bishop Alexander, 
when he first propounded his doctrine that the Son is 
created and not from eternity. Condemned by the 



THE ONE HUNDRED WITNESSES. 105 

Council of Nice in 325 he was banished. He made his 
submissions in a creed artfully worded, and returned 
to Alexandria, whence he was expelled by Atha- 
nasius his chief opponent. Repairing to Constantino- 
ple, the emperor, much against the wishes of the patri- 
arch Alexander, peremptorily required that he should 
be again received into the communion of the Alexan- 
drian church ; but before this requisition could be for- 
mally carried out, he died very suddenly, not without 
suspicion of poison, in the year 336. Some of his 
writings, consisting principally of poems and letters, 
are still extant, and contain a variety of important tes- 
timony which there is no reason to impeach. 

Arnobius, a teacher of rhetoric at Sicca in Africa, 
near the close of the third century, was at first an open 
opponent of Christianity. By a remarkable dream he 
was brought to acknowledge Christ, and requested 
baptism of the bishop of Sicca, who required, as a 
proof of the sincerity and genuineness of his conver- 
sion, that he should write a book in defence of the 
Christian faith. This gave occasion to his celebrated 
work, entitled Disputations against the Gentiles, now 
indeed far more valuable for its testimony to facts 
than for its logical arguments. 

Athanasius succeeded Alexander in the episcopal 
dignity at Alexandria in 326, and died in 373. His 
whole official life was spent in heated and violent con- 
troversy with Arius and the Arians, sometimes trium- 
phant and sometimes conquered, so that, of the forty- 
six years of his bishopric, twenty were spent in exile. 
It was not till after the death of the emperor Yalens, 
that his triumph became complete and permanent. 



106 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

The creed which bears his name was not his composi- 
tion, but a large number of his writings are extant, 
easily accessible and of great value. 

Atlienagoras was a philosopher of Athens about the 
year 160. After his conversion to Christianity he 
wrote an apology for the Christians, directed to the 
emperor Marcus Aurelius and his son Commodus, and a 
treatise on the resurrection of the dead, a subject of 
great interest at Athens, as we learn from the apostle 
Paul, Acts xvii. These writings are both still accessi- 
ble. 

Aurelius Augustin, the son of Patricius and Monica, 
was born at Tagaste in Africa, in the year 359. In 
early life, through the influence of bad associates, he 
was much given to dissipation, and was *for a consid- 
erable time partial to the doctrines of the Manichaeans. 
He lived at Rome and later at Milan as a teacher of 
rhetoric. By the influence of Ambrose especially he 
he was led to the study of the Scriptures and particu- 
larly the Epistles of Paul. After a long and severe 
inward struggle, he became a convert to Christianity, 
and returned to Africa first as a priest and afterwards 
as bishop of Hippo, in which last position he remained 
during his life. He was the most powerful and 
influential of all the teachers of the Latin church. 
Particularly by his conflict with the Pelagians he came 
to precise statements respecting the doctrines of sin 
and grace, and thus became the most celebrated the- 
ologian of the Christian world. His writings are volu- 
minous and of easy access. 

Bardesanes was a native of Mesopotamia and lived 
at Edessa about 170. He at first belonged to the 



THE ONE HUNDRED WITNESSES. 107 

orthodox church, then became a convert to Valentinus, 
then became the founder of a Gnostic system of his 
own, but in the latter part of his life returned to 
sounder views. He was a man of candor, acuteness 
and learning. He wrote much in the Syrian language, 
and his works were so highly esteemed that they were 
translated into Greek and widely read. He published 
refutations of Marcion and almost all the heretics of 
his time ; he composed a dialogue on fate dedicated to 
Antoninus, a work on the persecutions to which the 
Christians were subjected, etc. Eusebius gives him a 
high character. E. H. xx. 30. 

Barnabas, a Levite of Cyprus, according to Clement 
of Alexandria one of the seventy disciples. He was 
the companion of Paul at Antioch and also on his first 
missionary journey ; and after his separation from Paul 
he went with Mark to Cyprus, and probably to other 
places, preaching the gospel. There is an interesting 
epistle which the ancients universally ascribe to him, 
though it has been doubted by some of the moderns. 
It is contained entire in the original Greek in the 
famous Sinai manuscript discovered by Teschendorf. 
It has been often published, was highly esteemed in 
the ancient church, and though in its present form it 
may contain some interpolations, there is no good rea- 
son for rejecting it as a whole. 

Basilides, the most celebrated of the Egyptian 
Gnostics, lived at the close of the first and the begin- 
ning of the second century. He propagated his senti- 
ments with great activity, zeal and power, in Africa 
and Asia, assigning great prominence to the doctrines 
of emanation and dualism. He wrote a commentary 



108 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

on the Gospels in 24 books, which was refuted by 
Agrippa Castor, and from which subsequent Christian 
writers have made many extracts. An apocryphal 
gospel is also ascribed to him. His testimony is very 
valuable as to the Gospels and other New Testament 
books received in his time. Eusebius, H. E. iv. 7. 

Basil the Great, the brother of Gregory of Nyssa, 
was born at Caesarea in Cappadocia near the begin- 
ning of the fourth century. He studied at Antioch, 
Constantinople and Athens, became a monk and a 
founder of monasteries in Pontus ; he was afterwards 
a presbyter in Caesarea, his native place, under Euse- 
bius, but disagreeing with his bishop, he returned to 
his monkish life in Pontus ; and again becoming recon- 
ciled to Eusebius, he succeeded him as bishop of Cae- 
sarea in Cappadocia. He was one of the most distin- 
guished men of his time and a zealous helper of Atha- 
nasius in his conflict with the Arians. His works still 
extant are very numerous and have often been repub- 
lished. Among them we have 428 letters, 9 homi- 
lies in verse, monastic rules, liturgies, etc. 

Beryllus was bishop of Bostra in Arabia, about the 
year 290. He held some notions respecting the person 
of Christ, which Origen so effectually refuted that he 
renounced them entirely, and became in consequence 
one of Origen's firmest and most devoted friends. 

Gains, a presbyter at Borne about the year 200. 
He was the author of three works of which there are 
fragments preserved by Eusebius ; and the Italian Mu- 
ratori, not without good reason, ascribes to him a frag- 
ment containing one of the most ancient and interest- 
ing catalogues in existence of the writings of the New 



THE ONE HUNDRED WITNESSES. 109 

Testament at that time received. He is very often 
quoted by the church historian Eusebius, who sets great 
value on his testimony. The important fragment re- 
ferred to was discovered in the Ambrosian library at 
Milan by the librarian Muratori, about the year 1720. 

Carpocrates lived at Alexandria in Egypt early in 
the second century, and was the founder of an anti- 
nomian system of Gnosticism, which was further de- 
veloped and propagated by his son Epiphanius. He is 
largely quoted by Irenaeus, Epiphanius and others. 

Cassianus (Julius), a Yalentinian Gnostic of the 
second century, whose writings are quoted by Clement 
of Alexandria. 

Cassiodorus (Magnus Aurelius) was born at Cala- 
bria about the year 470. He was prime minister of 
Theodoric, and was engaged in political life with great 
distinction and success till he was seventy years old. 
He then retired to a monastery founded by himself 
in Calabria, and became a very voluminous writer on 
religious subjects, living to be more than ninety years 
old. 

Celsus was a heathen, an Epicurean philosopher, and 
a violent enemy of the Christians. He lived in the 
latter part of the first and the beginning of the second 
century, very near the time when the books of the 
New Testament were first collected into a volume. 
He wrote a very elaborate book which he entitled the 
True Word (or Logos), in which he undertakes to 
refute the Christians out of their own writings. He 
introduces a Jew who quotes very largely from the 
Christian Scriptures. The very object and plan of the 
work, as well as the zeal and ability of the author, 



110 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

make it an invaluable witness to the Christian books 
as then received. Though we have not the book of 
Oelsus entire, yet in the refutation of it by Origen, 
there are very large and literal quotations from it, in 
which the views of this zealous pagan in regard to the 
Christian books, as he read thern at that early period, 
are very fully developed. There is nowhere to be 
found a more important witness to the integrity and 
genuineness of the books of the New Testament than 
this very zealous and able enemy of Christianity. 

Chrysostom {John) was born at Antioch about the 
year 354. He was one of the most effective preachers 
of the Christian church, and it was on account of his 
eloquence that he received the surname of Chrysostom 
or Golden Mouth. He was patriarch of Constantino- 
ple, but had a very bitter enemy in the empress 
Eudoxia, by whose influence he was twice banished, 
and he finally died in exile at Comane in Pontus in the 
year 407. His writings are very numerous, consisting 
of treatises, sermons and letters; they have been 
collected with great care, and frequently published in 
very handsome volumes. He is the prince of the 
Greek Church Fathers. 

Claudius Apollinaris was bishop of Hierapolis in 
Phrygia about the year 173, and an able and zealous 
defender of the Christian truth. The ancients, par- 
ticularly Eusebius and Jerome, were acquainted with 
many of his writings, as for example, an apology to 
the emperor Marcus Aurelius, five books against the 
pagans, two respecting the truth, two against the Jews, 
letters against the Montanists;. but none of these are 
now extant. 



THE ONE HUNDRED WITNESSES. Ill 

Clement of Rome, the same spoken of by Paul in 
Ms Epistle to the Phil. iv. 3, was a Roman by birth, a dis- 
ciple of the apostles, and bishop of Rome at the close 
of the first century. Under his name we have two 
epistles to the church at Corinth, the first genuine and 
entire, but the second a mere fragment and of doubt- 
ful authority. The book ascribed to him, under the 
title of Recognitions, is a religious romance in ten 
books which we have only in the Latin translation of 
Rufinus. The Clementina, 19 homilies, appear to be 
a reproduction of the Recognitions in a modified form. 
These works are very important as contributions to 
the history of the Ebionites ; they belong to the ear- 
liest period of Christian literature after the New Testa- 
ment, and probably may be the genuine works 
of Clement the friend of Paul. The Canons of the 
Apostles, and the Apostolic Constitutions are more 
doubtful as to their authorship ; and the same may 
be said of the five letters, one of which is directed 
to the apostle James. All these books have been 
many times published, and are very valuable as wit- 
nesses to the opinions and the literature of the 
first age of the Christian church ; and they all tend to 
confirm the genuineness of the New Testament books, 
as we now have them. 

Clement {Titus Flavins) of Alexandria, was by birth 
a pagan and well instructed in all the branches of 
Greek literature. He received his Christian instruc- 
tion from the celebrated Alexandrian teacher Pantae- 
nus, in the year 187 became his successor in the presi- 
dency of the catechetic school, and in the course of time 
had the world famed Origen as one of his scholars. His 



112 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Institutes, in which he gave a concise view of the con- 
tents of the Old and New Testament, are lost, except 
a few fragments preserved by later writers. But we 
have five entire works by him which are of great value 
and which in their day laid the foundation of Christian 
theology as a science. We see in all his writings that 
he used the same Bible, especially the same New Tes- 
tament, which we now have. 

Cyprian (Thasctus Caecilius) was born in Carthage, 
of pagan parents, about the year 200. He was at first 
a teacher of rhetoric, a heathen, a man of genius, and 
rather dissipated. In 245 he was converted to Chris- 
tianity by means of Caecilius, a presbyter of Carthage, 
and immediately entered the service of the church; 
and though he lived but twelve years after this, by 
his incessant activity and great strength of character 
he rendered services which have placed his name 
among the highest of all Christian antiquity. He be- 
came bishop of Carthage in 248 ; during the Decian 
persecution he fled, while others apostatised ; and the 
question of their subsequent restoration gave rise to a 
violent controversy, which he with great difficulty sup- 
pressed. He took part with the Roman bishop Cor- 
nelius against his rival Novatian, in order to restore 
the unity of the church. When another bishop of 
Rome, Stephen, undertook to impose the traditions 
of Rome on other churches as if they were of univer- 
sal obligation, Cyprian was his most energetic and 
determined opponent. In the persecution under- 
Valerian he was at first exiled and then beheaded in 
the year 256. His works, consisting of short treatises, 
called forth by the exigencies of his times, and familiar 



THE ONE HUNDRED WITNESSES. 113 

letters, have been preserved with great care and often 
republished. Of his letters there are more than eighty, 
and they give a most striking and truthful picture of 
all that pertains to the organization and discipline, the 
spirit and the life of the church at that early period. 
He had high ideas of the episcopal authority, and was 
most distinguished as an organizer and disciplinarian. 

Cyrill, bishop of Jerusalem, in the middle of the 
fourth century. At first he was a moderate semi-Arian, 
but subsequently adopted the Nicene creed, and for 
this was by the Arian party expelled from his see. 
His writings that remain to us consist of catechetical 
instructions for youth and recent converts, with frag- 
ments of sermons, etc. 

Cyrill, bishop of Alexandria, belongs to the fifth 
century, and was a leading man of his time. He was 
the chief opponent of Nestorius, and summoned 
against him the council of Ephesus in 431. Besides 
his controversial works against Nestorius and others, 
we have from him commentaries on John's Gospel, the 
twelve minor prophets, Isaiah, and select portions of 
the Pentateuch. 

Dionysius, bishop of Rome in 252, has left three let- 
ters, one particularly against the Sabellians. The works 
published in the name of Dionysius the Areopagite at 
Athens, a convert of Paul the apostle (Acts, xvii) are 
undoubtedly spurious and belong to the fourth or fifth 
century. 

Dionysius, bishop of Corinth in 170. Ancient 
writers, particularly Eusebius and Jerome, have fre- 
quent references to his letters, but we have none of 
them entire. He was a man of great authority among 
8 



114 THE BOOKS, OF THE BIBLE. 

the churches of his day. He died the death of a mar- 
tyr in 173. 

Dionysius of Alexandria, surnamed the great, was 
a scholar of Origen, was by him converted to Chris- 
tianity from paganism, and became bishop in 247. 
His official life was a very disturbed one. In the De- 
cian persecution he suffered a long imprisonment, with 
the bishop Nepos he had a controversy in regard 
to the millennium in which he had the pleasure of 
bringing over that bishop to his own anti-millenarian 
views ; he affirmed the validity of heretic baptism, and 
met with severe opposition on this account ; he wrote 
against Sabellius and also against Paul of Samosata ; 
during the Valerian persecution he was driven into 
exile; and after a most unquiet life he died in 269. 
Of his numerous writings we have only fragments 
remaining, which have been collected and published. 

Epliraem the Syrian was born at Nisibis in Mesopo- 
tamia, became abbot of the cloister in Edessa, and died 
in 378, He was a voluminous writer in the Syrian 
language ; his works were highly esteemed ; they were 
translated into Greek and read in many churches. As 
we have already observed, the text of the New Testa- 
ment itself was in one instance at least obliterated to 
furnish parchment for a copy of Ephraem's Sermons ; 
a symbol of what has often happened in the Christian 
church since his time. His works have been frequently 
and very handsomely published. 

Epiphanius was of Jewish origin, and born in a vil- 
lage near Jerusalem about the year 310. After his 
conversion to Christianity he became a Monk in Pales- 
tine and was afterwards made bishop of Salamis in 





i 
i 







THE ONE HUNDRED WITNESSES. 115 

the island of Cyprus. He was full of zeal against 
heretics, and among his other writings is a ponderous 
work against 80 heresies. He assailed with great energy- 
John, bishop of Jerusalem, on account of his supposed 
attachment to the principles of Origen, and endeav- 
ored, though in vain, to enlist Chrysostom in his cru- 
sade against Origenism. He did not begin to be an 
author till after he was sixty, and pursued the calling 
with characteristic zeal and industry till he was past 
ninety. He died while returning from a long journey 
which he had made in his zeal against Origenism. His 
works are hasty, fiery, and" full of mistakes, but valua- 
ble on account of the many quotations which he makes 
from ancient writings now lost. For his time he was 
a remarkable linguist, being acquainted with Hebrew, 
Syrian, Egyptian, Greek and Latin. His works are to 
this day easily accessible. He is a remarkable exam- 
ple of zeal, industry and sincerity in heresy hunting. 
His quotations from other authors are generally faith- 
ful and reliable. 

Eusebius, surnamed Parwphilus, from his friend the 
martyr, was born in Palestine in the year 264 and died 
in 340. He is the most valuable of all the early church 
historians, and has been perhaps sufficiently charac- 
terized in the second chapter of this work. He was 
bishop of Caesarea in Palestine, an amazingly diligent 
reader and writer, amiable, unprejudiced and candid. 
He endeavored to protect Arius against Alexander the 
bishop of Alexandria, and thus incurred for himself 
the suspicion of Arianism, though he subscribed the 
Nicer? e creed; and he was sent on an embassy to Con-- 
stantine in regard to Athanasius. He became an Mti 



116 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

mate personal friend of that celebrated emperor, and 
had a most favorable opinion of him, which is not at 
all surprising considering the circumstances. His nu- 
merous historical writings are still held in great esteem, 
and there is nothing that can supply their place. Not- 
withstanding all that partizan zeal has from time to 
time alleged against him, there is no historian equally 
voluminous on whom fewer errors can be proved. 

There were other distinguished churchmen of the 
same name, during that age, as a bishop of Emessa in 
359, who published homilies, and a bishop of Ver- 
celli in 371. 

Evagrius Scholasticus was born at Epiphania in Coel- 
esyria in the year 536, and was a lawyer at Antioch. 
We have from him an ecclesiastical history in 6 books 
including the period between the years 431 and 594; 
a valuable work, though somewhat marred by the 
credulity of the author and his faith in monkish 
legends. 

Firmilianus, bishop of Caesarea in Cappadocia, was 
a great admirer of Origen, and he took an active part 
in all the church questions of his time. We have from 
him an able letter to Cyprian, in which he takes part 
with that prelate against the assumptions of Stephen, 
the bishop of Rome. He is referred to' by Eusebius, 
E. H. vi. 26, 29, 46 ; vii. 5, 29. 

Gregory, surname d Thaumaturgus or Wonder Worker, 
on account of the wonderful works which he is said to 
have wrought, was born of wealthy and respectable 
heathen parents at New Caesarea in Pontus about the 
year 210. In 231 he was on his way to Berytus in- 
tending to study law at the famous school in that 



THE ONE HUNDRED WITNESSES. 117 

place ; but meeting with Origen he was converted to 
Christianity, and the whole purpose of his life was 
changed. He studied with Origen eight years. He 
was made bishop of his native city about the year 243 
or 4. At that time there were said to be only sev- 
enteen Christians in the whole city ; but such was 
the energy and success of his labors there, that when 
he died in 270, there were scarcely so many pagans 
left in the place, though a very populous one. In the 
Decian persecution he was obliged to flee. Afterwards 
he took part against Paul of Samosata in 269 at the 
Council of Antioch. He was a diligent student of 
Scripture, and a most laborious and faithful pastor. 
His fame filled the North and the East, and even the 
pagans called him the second Moses. 

Gregory of Nazianzen, was born in the year 300 at 
Nazianzen in Cappadocia, where his father was bishop. 
He was the confidential friend of Basil the great, was 
sometime bishop of Constantinople, but finally retired 
to private life and died in 391. When Julian the 
apostate prohibited the Christians the use of the Greek 
and Roman classics, Gregory and some others endeav- 
ored to fill the gap by writings of their own. In the 
Arian controversy he kept the congregations at Con- 
stantinople warmly engaged against the heretics. On 
account of his great attainments in divinity he was 
surnamed the Theologian. He published discourses, 
of which there are two against Julian written with 
great severity ; we have of his nearly 250 letters ; and 
more than 150 poetical pieces in different kinds of verse. 
His works were highly esteemed, carefully preserved, 
and are still accessible in good editions. 



118 THE BOOKS OP THE BIBLE. 

Gregory of Nyssa, brother of Basil the great, was 
born at Pontus in Macedonia, was at first a rhetorician, 
then a monk, and finally bishop of Nyssa. He was 
exiled from his see for eight years by the Arians, and 
attended both the councils of Constantinople in 381 
and 394. He was highly celebrated for his eloquence 
as a preacher. The time of his death is uncertain. 
His writings, treatises, orations, poems, etc., are well 
preserved. 

Hegesippus was a Jew by birth and a member of the 
Christian congregation at Jerusalem. He composed 
at Rome, about the year 176, a historical work under 
the title of Memoirs, which described, in 5 books, the 
vicissitudes of the church of Christ from its origin to 
his own time. Nothing remains of this work but the 
fragments preserved by Eusebius. He died in 180. A 
history of the Jewish war and the destruction of Jeru- 
salem, which are ascribed to him, are not his. Euse- 
bius, E. H. iii. 19, 20, 32; iv. 8, 22. 

Heracleon, of whom but little is known, was a disci- 
ple of Valentine, about the year 126. He wrote 
largely on the New Testament books, but though we 
have none of his works entire, yet copious extracts are 
made from them by Clement of Alexandria and Ori- 
gen. Being a Gnostic, and of that very early period, 
his testimony is particularly valuable. 

Heraclitus, in the latter part of the second century, 
is mentioned by Jerome and Eusebius as an able com- 
mentator on the Epistles of Paul. 

Hermas. Under this name there was in the most 
ancient church, and held in the highest esteem, a book 
entitled the Pastor or Shepherd. The ancients sup- 



THE ONE HUNDRED WITNESSES. 119 

posed the author to be the Hermas mentioned by Paul 
in Rom. xvi. 14. Others would ascribe it to Hermas, 
a brother of Pius, bishop of Rome, about the year 156. 
But the great authority of the book as early as the 
time of Irenaeus (from 140 to 200) would certainly 
indicate the correctness of the first opinion rather than 
the second. In the work, which consists of three 
books, an angel in the guise of a shepherd gives in- 
structions to Hermas on the various duties of the Chris- 
tian life, in the form of visions, commands and simili- 
tudes. It was for many ages extant in a Latin trans- 
lation only, with the exception of a few sentences; 
but in the famous Sinai manuscript discovered by 
Tischendorf we have the original Greek of a consider- 
able portion of it. It is a most precious relic of the 
very highest Christian antiquity. 

Hermias, who lived towards the close of the second 
century, while paganism was still in the ascendant and 
all powerful, wrote a sharp polemic work in opposi- 
tion to it, entitled Irrisio Gentilium PMlosophorum, 
Ridicule of the Gentile Philosophers, which is in- 
teresting as a specimen of the very earliest Christian 
polemics. It is still accessible in good editions. 

Hieronymus (Sophronius Eusebius) was born in the 
year 330 at Strido in Dalmatia. He was one of the 
most learned of all the church fathers, particularly in 
everything pertaining to the literature of the Bible. 
In English we generally write his name Jerome. He 
received at Rome his first instruction in the sciences, 
traveled extensively, and finally withdrew to a solitude 
near Bethlehem in Palestine, where he spent his life in 
the study of the Scriptures and the composition of 



120 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

various learned works in the several departments of 
Christian literature. He employed a Jew to teach 
him Hebrew, and was a most diligent and faithful stu- 
dent. His greatest work was the revising of the com- 
mon Latin translation of the Bible called the Yulgate, 
and writing for the several books of Scripture erudite 
prefaces containing all that could be ascertained re- 
specting the authors, times and occasions of writing, 
etc. Even the most laborious investigations of mod- 
ern times have in many instances scarcely advanced 
beyond the results of Jerome. Of most of the sacred 
books he made new translations very much superior to 
any that had preceded. His writings are among the 
richest of the ancient sources of critical investigation, 
there are passages in them of surpassing eloquence, he 
was altogether sincere and earnest ; but he always 
wrote hastily, and was often passionate and prejudiced. 
He had several fierce controversies with Rufinus, Au- 
gustin and others ; and when excited, as he always was 
almost in controversy, he did not hesitate to call his 
opponents by the roughest kind of names. His wri- 
tings were numerous, mainly on exegetical and his- 
torical subjects; they have been carefully preserved, 
and are accessible in many good editions. He died in 
420 at the age of 90. 

Hilary, called by many the Western Athanasius, 
was born in Poitiers in Aquitania, educated in pagan- 
ism ; but converted to Christianity by the reading of 
the Bible, he became bishop of his native city in 355. 
For his opposition to Arianism he was banished to 
Phrygia ; but after his return, he sought with redoubled 
zeal to purify France from this heresy. He died in 



THE ONE HUNDRED WITNESSES. 121 

368. He wrote on the trinity, commentaries, hymns, 
etc. His works are preserved with a good degree of 
completeness, and have often been published in hand- 
some and readable editions. 

Hippolytus (Eusebius, H. E. vi. 20, 22) belongs to 
the close of the second century, and was one of the 
most active and influential churchmen of his day. He 
was a scholar of Irenaeus and a friend of Origen. He 
was bishop of Ostia at the mouth of the Tiber, and 
died a martyr's death. His writings consist of com- 
mentaries on the Old and New Testaments, sermons, 
dogmatic and polemic treatises, historical disquisitions, 
etc. His personal history was very little known even to 
Eusebius and others of the earliest writers. But it has 
been gradually coming to light even in modern times. 
In 1551 a statue of him with an inscription giving 
some account of him and his writings was disinterred 
near Rome ; in 1661 a polemic work of his was dis- 
covered ; and in 1842, there were found in Greece 
seven books, that is from the 4th to the 10th, of his 
great work on all the heresies, of which only the first 
book had before been known. This discovery pro- 
duced a wide-spread excitement in the learned world, 
and gave rise to numerous publications illustrating, 
from Hippolytus, the doctrines, rites and ethics of the 
ancient church. 

Ignatius, surnamed Theophorus, was a pupil of the 
apostle John, and by him ordained bishop of Antioch, 
which office he held forty years. He lived through 
the persecution of Domitian, but in the reign of Tra- 
jan he was condemned to death, and after a most re- 
markable conversation with the emperor, an account 



&J>* 



$1 THE BOOKS <DF THE BIBLE 



of which Is still extant ; he was taken to Rome and 
there suffered martyrdom by being thrown to wild 
beasts about the year 109 (Eusebius, E. H. iii. 36). 
An account of his martyrdom, written by the friends 
who attended him on his journey, is still preserved. 
While at Smyrna, and at Troas, on his way to Rome, 
he wrote letters to several of the Christian churches, 
and one to his friend Polycarp. These seven epistles 
have been known and read in the Christian churches 
from the very earliest period. There is an edition of 
them of about the sixth century, which undoubtedly 
contains many interpolations ; but the earlier and 
briefer recensions, of which archbishop Usher had a 
Latin translation and I. Voss, the Greek original, may 
safely be received as genuine throughout Besides 
these seven there are others ascribed to Ignatius which 
may be rejected as spurious. The genuine epistles of 
Ignatius are among the most interesting of all the 
relics of Christian antiquity ; they have often been pub- 
lished and are easily accessible. 

Irenaeus was born at Smyrna probably about the 
year 120. He studied with Polycarp and Papias. He 
was a missionary to the pagans in France under Pothi- 
nus, from whom he received ordination ; and after the 
death of his master by martyrdom, he succeeded him 
as bishop of Lyons in the year 178. He was a faithful 
pastor of his flock, had great influence throughout the 
Christian world, and successfully withstood Victor, 
bishop of Rome, in his endeavors to impose the Ro- 
mish Easter on other churches. He suffered martyr- 
dom under Septimius Sever us in the year 202. Euse- 
Inus, E. H. v. 15, 20, 24, 26. He was probably the 



THE ONE HUNDRED WITNESSES. 123 

author of the letter, still extant, which gives so graphic 
and terrible a description of the persecutions suffered by 
the churches of Vienne and Lyons in France in the year 
177. His great work is his five books against heresies, 
which is still extant, partly in the original Greek, but 
mostly in a very ancient and rather barbarous Latin 
translation. The work contains a great amount of in- 
formation as to the origin, doctrines and character of 
the ancient heretics ; as well as of the theological tenets 
of the orthodox churches of that age, and the most 
approved mode of stating and defending them. The 
book is a very common one. 

Isidorus, the son of the Gnostic Basilides, wrote 
works both of an exegetical and ethical character, of 
which fragments are preserved by Clement of Alexan- 
dria and Epiphanius. 

Isidorus of Alexandria, surnamed Pelusiota, a monk 
of Pelusium, was distinguished for his abstemious and 
severe life. He belongs to the latter part of the fourth 
century, and has left over two thousand letters arranged 
in five books. 

Jerome, see Hieronymus. 

Jornandes or Jordanes, a Goth, was before his conver- 
sion a notary, then a monk, and finally a bishop about the 
year 550. His works are historical, and contain. im- 
portant testimonies. 

Joseplius {Flavins), the great historian of the Jews, 
born at Jerusalem in the year 37, son of a priest, and 
of the sect of the Pharisees. In the Roman war he 
held with great distinction the Jewish military com- 
mand in Galilee ; but being defeated and made a pris- 
oner by Vespasian, he became an intimate friend of 



124 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

the emperor and his son, and was employed by Titus 
as a negotiator with the Jews in the siege of Jerusalem. 
His last years were spent at Rome. His works are 
well known. His testimonies to Christ and the early 
history of Christianity have by some been rejected as 
spurious, but without sufficient reason. 

Julius Africanus (Eusebius, E. H. i. 7 ; vi. 31) was 
by birth a Lybian, and dwelt at Emmaus in Palestine, 
and he is by some called bishop of Emmaus, which is 
the same as Nicopolis. When the city was destroyed 
by fire about the year 220, Julius was sent on an em- 
bassy to the emperor Heliogobalus to have it rebuilt. 
He was a man of great learning and influence, and has 
left some important writings, though now mostly in 
fragments. His letter to Aristides on the genealogies 
in Matthew and Luke, and a letter to Origen on the 
genuineness of the story of Susanna in the Greek 
Daniel, we have entire ; but of his great historical 
summary from the creation to A. D. 221, and an elab- 
orate treatise on natural science and medicine, only 
fragments remain. 

Justin (Flavius, the Martyr) was born at Neapolis, 
the ancient Shechem, in the beginning of the 2d cen- 
tury. From his early youth he had an intense longing 
to acquire a knowledge of divine things. He gave him- 
self to the study of philosophy, and attended the instruc- 
tions of a Stoic, a Peripatetic, and Pythagorean, but with- 
out obtaining satisfaction. With a Platonist he succeeded 
better ; but once as he was taking a solitary walk, ab- 
sorbed in meditation, he was met by a venerable old 
man who referred him to the writings of the prophets 
and apostles and the instructions of Christ. A dili- 



THE ONE HUNDRED WITNESSES. 125 

gent study of the Bible, and a witnessing of the stead- 
fastness of the Christians under the most severe perse- 
cutions, brought him over to Christianity. He thence- 
forward devoted himself to a defence of the Christian 
faith, and especially to a vindication of it to the men 
of learning among the pagans. For this purpose he 
always retained the philosopher's mantle, and went to 
Rome and founded a school there. Through the 
malice of a certain Cynic by the name of Crescens he 
suffered a martyr's death at Rome in the year 167. 
Justin is the first of the church fathers, whose writings 
have come down to us, that brings Christianity into 
connection with philosophy ; and he was followed as a 
model by subsequent defenders of the faith. His 
larger apology was addressed to the emperor Anto- 
ninus Pius about the year 139, and the smaller to Mar- 
cus Aurelius in 163 or thereabouts. In both these 
works the argument is addressed mainly to the pagans. 
For the Jews he wrote a dialogue which he professes 
to have held with Trypho, a Jew, while walking in 
the gymnasium or Xystus at Ephesus. As to the gen- 
uineness of these works there can be no reasonable 
doubt. 

There is a very ancient letter to Diognetus, giving 
an account, minute and interesting, of the opinions 
and practices of the Christians of the earlier period, 
that has sometimes been ascribed to Justin the Martyr, 
but without sufficient grounds. It is a genuine and 
most valuable relic of the earliest Christian age, and 
its statements are authentic and of the deepest interest, 
but the author is unknown. 

Lactantius ( Caecilius Firmianus). an Italian or Afri- 



126 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

can, a pupil of Arnobius in eloquence ; but he so far 
surpassed his teacher that he gained for himself the 
title of the Christian Cicero. He devoted himself to 
the instruction of youth, and was appointed by Con- 
stantine the Great the tutor of his son Crispus in the 
year. 3 17. He died about 325. His principal work 
is his Institutes in seven books. His works have been 
highly esteemed, and frequently and handsomely pub- 
lished. The language, generally, is more noticeable 
than the thought. 

Lucian, of Samosata in Syria, an Epicurean philoso- 
pher and distinguished orator of the second half of 
the second century. He traveled extensively and 
learned much of the follies of mankind. In his dia- 
logues, which have had a great run, he ridiculed with 
much sharpness and wit the sacred things of the pa- 
gans, and did not spare the Christians. Much can be 
learned from this merciless satirist, whose works are 
too congenial to the ill nature of mankind ever to be 
lost or become obsolete. 

Manes or Mani, the founder of the Manichaeans, 
was born in the early part of the third century. He 
was a Persian, educated among the Magi, and on be- 
coming acquainted with the Christian books, combined 
the Christian doctrines with the Magian, gave himself 
out for the Paraclete or Comforter promised by Christ, 
and founded a new system of religion, which embraced 
some of the ideas of Christ, but was characterized by 
the old Zoroastrian dogma of dualism, or two original 
principles of light and darkness, of good and evil, in 
perpetual and everlasting conflict. Being an artist as 
well as a philosopher he composed a work illustrative 



THE ONE HUNDRED WITNESSES. 127 

of his system, which he adorned with splendid pic- 
tures, and it was called by the Persians ErtmM-Mani, 
or the Gospel of Manes. He traveled extensively, 
wrote other works, and had numerous followers. Hor- 
misdas, king of Persia, was among his converts. But 
the next king, Yaranes I. put him to a most cruel death 
as a perverter of religion in the year 277 ; but for many 
generations afterwards his followers were numerous and 
influential, among whom was the great Augustin in 
the early part of his life. Extracts from the writings 
of this most remarkable and erratic genius are pre- 
served by Epiphanius. 

Marcion was born at Sinope, where his father was 
bishop, early in the second century. He visited Rome 
and was there acquainted with Justin Martyr and Val- 
entinus the Gnostic. He became the founder of an 
anti-Jewish Gnostic sect, which as late as the fourth 
century had its own churches and bishops. He rejected 
the Old Testament and compiled, mainly from Luke, 
a gospel of his own, which is still extant. He received 
as divinely inspired ten of the epistles of Paul, and is 
a good witness for all the New Testament books as 
they were received by the Orthodox churches of his 
time. He regarded Matthew, Mark and John as Juda- 
Izers, who failed to comprehend the doctrine of the 
good God as expounded by Jesus of Nazareth ; but 
recognized as genuine the Gospels ascribed to them. 
He was himself a believer in the dualism of the Per- 
sians, as was Manes also a century afterward. Consid- 
ering the history and condition of the world from the 
beginning to the present time, it is rather surprising 
that this solution of the great problem of the existence 



128 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

of moral and physical evil, has not been more popular 
among theologians of modern times. It held great 
sway over the minds of many of the profoundest 
thinkers of the old Oriental world, and was exten- 
sively received for many ages after Christ. 

Marcus, a native of Palestine and a disciple of Val- 
entinus, belongs to the second half of the second cen- 
tury. He set forth his Gnostic doctrines in a poem, a 
liturgy, and symbols. Irenaeus, in his first book against 
heretics, gives an account of him and his writings, 
from which it appears that he is a good witness for the 
books of the New Testament, especially for the first 
three Gospels. 

Maximiis, a writer against the Gnostics, was cotempo- 
rary with Marcus above mentioned, and probably the 
bishop of Jerusalem. He is mentioned by Eusebius, 
E. H. v. 27, and quoted by him in his other works as 
a witness to the four Gospels. John and Matthew, 
Mark and Luke, four evangelists (he says) but one 
Gospel. 

Melito, bishop of Sardis, about 160, was one of the 
most active and influential of the church fathers of his 
time. A good account of him and his writings is 
given by Eusebius, E. H. iv. 26. He traveled to Pal- 
estine for the purpose of ascertaining exactly the He- 
brew canon of Scripture, and to him we are indebted 
for the earliest Christian catalogue of the books of the 
Old Testament. 

Methodius, bishop of Tyre in Phoenicia, or Patara 
in Lycia, probably was martyred in the Diocletian 
persecution about the year 311. Several of his wri- 
tings are preserved ; and we have extracts in Epipha- 



THE ONL HUNDRED WITNESSES- 129 

nius and Photius and John of Damascus. He was a 
zealous opponent of Origen. 

Minucius Felix, a lawyer and advocate at Rome, 
probably of African origin, and converted to Chris- 
tianity about 225. His writings are important as wit- 
nessing to our sacred books, and have been often pub- 
lished. 

Montanus, a native of Mysia on the borders of Phry- 
gia, in the second half of the second century, was the 
founder of the sect of Montanists, in connection with 
the two female preachers Priscilla and Maximilla. He 
was a Millenarian of the most advanced type, and ex- 
ceedingly severe and ascetic in his rules of life. Epiph- 
anius gives us extracts from his writings. 

Nepos was bishop of Arsinoe in Egypt about the 
year 244. He at first wrote in defence of the most 
literal conception of the millennium, but being con- 
vinced of his error by Dionysius, bishop of Alexan- 
dria, he frankly and fully retracted. Besides his works 
on the millennium he was the author of psalms and 
hymns for the use of the churches. 

Nilus, a praefect in Constantinople, was afterwards 
with his son Theodulus a monk on Mount Sinai, where 
he died in the year 450. He gave a narrative of the 
slaughter of the monks on Mount Smai and the cap- 
tivity of Theodulus, and wrote treatises of general 
interest. 

Oecumenius, was a Greek writer, who compiled com- 
mentaries on the greater part of the New Testament, 
collected out of the writings of the ancients, and there- 
fore valuable to us. He probably lived in the tenth 
century ; and we still have quite complete his works on 
the Acts and the Epistles. 
9 



130 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Origen, surnamed Adamantius, son of Leonides the 
martyr, was born at Alexandria in Egypt in the year 
135. He was educated at the catechetic school in his 
native city, under Clement, and received instruction 
also from the philosopher Ammonius Saccus. After 
the death of his father he supported his mother and 
her family by teaching ; and at the age of eighteen 
became master of the celebrated Alexandrian cate- 
chetic school in which he had himself been instructed. 
At this time, from misunderstanding the passage in 
Matthew xix. 12, he did violence to his own person. 
Subsequently he made a journey to Rome ; in his twen- 
ty-fifth year he made himself master of the Hebrew 
language, and was sent to Arabia to instruct an emir 
in the Christian faith. After his return, the rage of 
Caracalla against the Alexandrians compelled him to 
flee to Palestine, and he publicly expounded the Scrip- 
tures in Caesarea. Recalled by Demetrius, bishop of 
Alexandria, he in Antioch became the teacher of Mam- 
maea, the mother of Alexander Severus ; again he spent 
a few years in Alexandria ; on a journey to Greece was 
ordained presbyter ; on which account his bishop De- 
metrius was enraged against him, accused him of heret- 
ical opinions, and summoned church councils which 
condemned and banished him. Origen then opened 
a school at Caesarea ; in the Severian persecution he 
fled to Cappadocia ; and when quiet was again restored, 
he visited Athens, Palestine and Bostra, where he found 
Beryll and converted him from his errors. In the De- 
cian persecution he was imprisoned and put to the tor- 
ture, and soon after his release he died at Tyre in the 
year 254 at the age of sixty-nine. Origen was one 



THE ONE HUNDRED WITNESSES. 131 

of the most wonderful men that any age or country 
has ever produced. Sincere, earnest, indefatigable, 
prolific, his numerous writings are among the richest 
treasures which Christian antiquity has left to us ; and 
no witness to the sacred books is more trustworthy, 
copious, and important than he. 

Pamphilus, a presbyter, was born at Berytus (Bei- 
rut) in Phoenecia, devoted himself to the study of the- 
ology, and made his home at Caesar ea in Palestine in 
the latter part of the third century. Here he employed 
his large fortune in the collecting of a Christian library, 
and copied many books, which it was impossible other- 
wise to procure, with his own hand, as for example the 
voluminous writings of Origen. This library was of 
invaluable benefit to Eusebius and Jerome, and other 
Christian writers. He also founded a Christian school 
in the same city, of which he was himself the teacher. 
Under the emperor Maximin, in the year 307, he was 
thrown into prison, and two years after put to death. 
His life was written by Eusebius. He published an 
edition of the Septuagint according to the revision of 
Origen, which was much used in Palestine and Syria, 
and an apology for Origen in six books, in conjunction 
with Eusebius. The Euthalian sections or chapters in 
the book of Acts are probably from him. 

Pantaenus of Sicily, of the second century, was at 
first a Stoic, and was converted to Christianity by a 
disciple of the apostles. He became master of the 
catechetic school at Alexandria, where he acquired 
a great reputation, and had some very distinguished 
scholars, as for example the Alexandrian Clement. He 
had been for a considerable time before this a preacher 



132 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

of the Gospel in India, and died at Alexandria in the 
year 212. He was the author of commentaries on the 
Scripture. He found in India certain Jewish Chris- 
tians who had the Gospel of Matthew in Hebrew, 
which had been left them by their teacher, the apostle 
Bartholomew. See Eusebius, E. H. v. 10. 

Pcvptas, bishop of Hierapolis in Phrygia about the 
year 100, according to Irenaeus and other ancients, a 
student of both the apostle John and of Polycarp, was a 
zealous millenarian, learning his doctrine, as he says, 
from the apostle John himself. Eusebius, E. H. iii. 39. 
He wrote five books containing traditional accounts of 
Christ, the apostles, and others of the primitive times. 
Fragments only of his works remain. Though a man 
of moderate intellectual capacity, he was evidently 
entirely honest and sincere, and a good witness in 
regard to the sacred books of his time. 

Philastrius, a native of Spain or Italy, at first a 
presbyter, in which capacity he traveled through the 
whole Roman empire, laboring for the conversion of 
heretics and pagans, and finally became bishop of 
Brescia in the time of Ambrose. He died in 389. 
He was a zealous defender of the Nicene creed, and 
wrote a book concerning heretics, which is still extant, 
in character much like that of Epiphanius, already 
noticed. 

Photius was at first chief secretary to the emperor 
at Constantinople, and then, in the year 850, was raised 
by Bardas, the uncle of the emperor Michael I., to the 
metropolitan see of Constantinople, in which office he 
made open schism with the church of Rome. He was 
twice deposed and as often reinstated. He died in 



THE ONE HUNDRED WITNESSES. 133 

891. He was the most learned of the Greek ecclesias- 
tics of his time, and his writings numerous and valua- 
ble are still preserved. Especially worthy of notice 
is his Mvq$$foov or Bibliotheca, containing extracts from 
280 ancient works read by him, most of which are 
now lost. It is quite common with a certain class of 
Protestant writers to date the papal anti-Christ from 
the schism with Photius. 

Polycarp, a disciple of St. John, and by him or- 
dained bishop of Smyrna. Of his family and native 
country nothing is known. He held his office for a long 
period, living on the most intimate terms with Ignatius, 
bishop of Antioch, visited on business of the church 
the bishop Anicetus at Rome, where he gave a 
sharp reproof to Marcion. He took Irenaeus under 
his instruction; and in the reign of Marcus Aure- 
lius was condemned to death, between the years 
164 and 168. The church at Smyrna gave a most 
affecting account of his death and his beautiful confes- 
sion at the stake in a letter to the churches of Pontus, 
which is preserved by Eusebius (E. H. iv. 15), and 
has been published in full by archbishop Usher. He 
wrote a letter to the Philippians, which is for the most 
part still extant. Some answers to Biblical questions are 
ascribed to him, in regard to the genuineness of which 
serious doubts have been raised. 

Poly crates, bishop of Ephesus about the year 196, 
wrote a synodical letter in the name of the bishop of 
his province to Victor of Rome, in which he resisted 
the assumptions of the Roman bishop, and affirmed 
that Easter ought to be celebrated on the 14th day of 
the month Nisan. Fragments of this letter are pre- 



134 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

served by Eusebius, E. EL iii. 31, v. 24, which gave 
important testimony to the Gospels. 

Polycarp, the celebrated philosopher of the new 
Platonic school, was born at Batanea in Syria, in the 
year 233. He was at first, it is said, a Christian, but 
afterwards apostatized and wrote an elaborate work in 
fifteen books against Christianity. The book itself is 
now lost, but copious extracts from it are given by 
Eusebius and Jerome. He quotes in these fragments, 
from Matthew, Mark, and John, also from the Acts or 
the Galatians. He assails the contents of the New 
Testament books, but never their genuineness. See 
Eusebius, E. H. vi. 19. 

Ptolomy was a Gnostic, a disciple of Valentinus, 
about the year 150, of whom we have several frag- 
ments preserved by Epiphanius, giving important tes- 
timony to the New Testament books. 

Rufinus Tyrannius, from Concordia in Italy, was a 
fellow student with Jerome in the monastery at Aqui- 
leia, where he was baptized. He lived for a long time 
in the East, principally in Egypt, and was a presbyter 
in the church at Jerusalem. He was an admirer of 
Qrigen, and on this account had a quarrel with Jerome, 
which, after a brief reconciliation, broke out anew 
after Rufinus had returned to Rome and translated 
some of the writings of Origen, and became exces- 
sively bitter. When Rome was conquered by Alaric 
the Goth, he fled to Messina, where he died in the year 
410. Besides his translations from Origen, he gave a 
Latin translation of the Ecclesiastical History of Euse- 
bius and a continuation of it, translations from several 
of the Greek fathers, apologies for Origen, and other 



THE ONE HUNDRED WITNESSES. 135 

original works. His translations are very free and not 
altogether trustworthy, but his writings are valuable 
as testimonies. 

Serapion was the successor of Theophilus in the 
bishopric of Antioch in the year 190. By an extract 
from one of his letters preserved by Eusebius (E. H. 
vi. 12), we see how careful the primitive churches 
were in respect to receiving books which claimed to 
be of apostolic origin, and how watchful they were to 
preserve the purity of the New Testament canon. 

Socrates, a lawyer of Constantinople, was born in 
the year 380. He wrote in seven books an ecclesias- 
tical history from the time of Constantine to the year 
439. It is the best of the historical writings of that 
period. He and also Sozomen bore the surname of 
Scholasticus, an honorary title indicating the esteem in 
which they were held. 

Sozomen Salamanes Hermias, was also a lawyer of 
Constantinople, and was living in the year 446. He 
also wrote in nine books a church history from 324 to 
439 ; a more vivacious work than that of Socrates, 
but hardly so reliable. 

Tatian was by birth a Syrian, but well instructed in 
the sciences of the Greeks. At Rome he became ac- 
quainted with the abominations of the secret doc- 
trines of the heathen ; and after studying the Scrip- 
tures in company with Justin Martyr, with whose 
school he was for a long time connected, he made open 
profession of the Christian faith. He as well as Justin 
was persecuted by Crescens. Tatian withdrew to the 
East, and there fell into certain Gnostic and especially 
Valentinian errors, taught dualism and doceticism, be- 



136 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

came excessively austere, and was the founder of the 
Encratites, who rejected even marriage as unchaste. 
He died about the year 190. We have from him an 
oration against the Greeks, written before he left the 
orthodox church. He here attacks the Greek philoso- 
phers, and asserts that they had learned all their wis- 
dom from the barbarians, and that the doctrine trans- 
mitted from the Hebrews to the Christians was the 
only true philosophy. He even in this treatise shows 
a strong tendency towards the Gnosticism which he 
subsequently advocated openly. His Harmony of the 
Gospels is lost, though some account of it is given by 
Eusebius, E. H. iv. 29, and also by Theodoret and 
Clement of Alexandria, and he is alluded to also by 
Irenaeus. His testimony to the Gospels, as given by 
his Harmony, is of great value, as is abundantly seen 
from the statements of those who had read it. A 
writer of the twelfth century, Dionysius Bar Salibi, 
testifies that the Harmony of Tatian began with the 
first words' of John's Gospel, In the "beginning was tlie 
Word. 

Tertullian (Quintus Septimius Florens) was born at 
Carthage about the year 160, and is the oldest of the 
Latin church fathers whose writings have reached us. 
He devoted himself at first to the study of the Ro- 
man law, but after his conversion to Christianity he 
was ordained presbyter, but whether at Carthage or 
Rome is uncertain. From this time with much learn- 
ing and a fiery zeal he assailed Jews, heathens and 
heretics, in a series of energetic treatises. His own 
severe and fiery nature, and perhaps also the many 
annoyances which he suffered from the Roman presby 



THE ONE HUNDRED WITNESSES. 137 

ters., induced him, about the year 203 s to join the Mon- 
tanists ; but he held their principles with moderation, 
and from this time onward he directed many sharp and 
energetic writings against the Romish church. He 
died, as some say, about the year 220, or, according 
to others, as late as 240. He writes in a peculiar and 
very difficult Latin style, but with rhetorical skill and 
great force and fire. His writings are numerous and 
have been well preserved and published very often. 
They are apologetic, polemic and practical. Being so 
numerous and diversified and written so near the apos- 
tolic age, by one who had been educated a Roman 
lawyer, and who was the son of a Roman soldier of 
proconsular rank, their testimony to the New Testament 
books is exceedingly interesting and important. His 
chief book, his Apology against the Gentiles, was ad- 
dressed to the Roman governors in Africa ; in his book 
on the testimony of the soul his object is to show that 
Christianity is founded in the nature of man. He 
wrote two books on marriage addressed to his own 
wife, in which he sets forth the principles that should 
govern Christian men and women in their domestic 
relations ; also a work to show that Christians ought 
not to attend the games and spectacles of the pagans ; 
another in defence of a Christian soldier who refused 
to wear the military garland ; one to show that Chris- 
tians should take no part in the construction of images 
or other implements of idolatry ; an exhortation to 
chastity to a widow against a second marriage ; a book 
to show that both married women and virgins should 
remain veiled in church ; one against female extrav*> 
gance in dress; one in defense of himself for putting 



138 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

off the Roman toga and assuming the philospher's 
mantle ; and on various other topics. 

Theodoret, the only son of pious parents, was born 
at Antioch about the year 390. He was educated at 
a neighboring monastery, where he was associated with 
Chrysostom and Nestorius. In 420 he was ordained 
bishop of Cyrus in Syria, and is said to have had the 
superintendence of 800 churches. The country was 
overrun with Marcionites and anti-trinitarian sects ; but 
such was his zeal and tact that he brought almost all 
of them into the communion of the orthodox church, 
having himself, as he says, baptized not less than ten 
thousand Marcionites. In 431 he took the part of 
Nestorius, his early friend, against Cyrill, and for this 
he was excommunicated in 449, but was restored to 
the communion of the church by Leo, bishop of Rome ; 
and after he had at Chalcedon, in 451, publicly recanted 
and given his vote against Nestorius, he was reinstated 
in his bishopric. From this time he devoted himself 
to writing till his death in 457. He left a commentary 
on most of the books of the Old Testament, and on 
all the Epistles of Paul, and a church history in con- 
tinuation of Eusebius to the year 427, besides several 
other works and nearly two hundred letters. His 
writings are among the best which that age produced ; 
they have been well preserved and handsomely pub- 
lished in good and readable editions. 
. Theodotus, a learned tanner of Byzantium, about 
the year 192, fled from persecution there and took 
refuge at Rome. Since he had denied Christ in that 
persecution for the sake of saving his own life, he was 
excommunicated by Victor, bishop of Rome. He 



THE ONB HUNDRED WITNESSES. 139 

then taught that Christ was a mere man, and this led 
him of course to reject the Gospel of John. He was 
welcomed among the Montanists. A considerable por- 
tion of one of his works, containing important testi- 
monies to the books of the New Testament, is still in 
good preservation among the writings of Clement of 
Alexandria. 

Tlieophilus was the sixth bishop of Antioch, about 
the year 168. He was heathen or Saducee, but by the 
reading of the Scriptures was brought to acknowledge 
the truth of Christianity and devote himself to the 
Christian ministry. Some account is given of him by 
Eusebius, E. H. iv. 20, 24. He wrote against Hermo- 
genes, against Marcion, and a commentary on the four 
Gospels. These writings are lost. But we have from 
him three books in vindication of Christianity, addressed 
to his pagan friend Autolycus. He takes much the 
same views as Justin Martyr. The three days of crea- 
tion preceding the appearance of the sun and moon 
he regards as typical of the trinity (Vafo?) of God, 
the earliest mention which we have of the word trinity. 
The account of vegetables springing up from the seeds 
he considers typical of the resurrection of our bodies, 
an idea which he might have borrowed from St. PauL 

Titus, bishop of Bostra in Arabia, suffered persecu- 
tion under Julian the apostate, and in the reign of 
Jovian attended the Synod of Antioch, in the year 
363. His three books against the Manichaeans are 
still extant. 

Yalentinus, the celebrated Gnostic, was by birth an 
Egyptian, probably of Jewish origin, and educated at 
Alexandria, about the year 120. Tertullian says he 



140 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

forsook the Christian church because he was not made 
a bishop. He formed a Gnostic system of his own, 
which he zealously propagated in the city of Rome, 
where he lived till the bishopric of Anicetus. His 
most celebrated disciples were Heracleon, Ptolemy, 
Mark, and Bardesanes. A gospel of his own, which 
he and his followers used, they called the gospel of 
truth. Several quotations from him, containing im- 
portant testimonies to our sacred books, are made by 
the church fathers, especially by Irenaeus. Some 
account of him is given by Eusebius, E. H. iv. 11. 
He cites all the Gospels, but gives the preference to 
John, and was familiar also with the writings of Paul. 
Victorinus, bishop of Pettau in Steiermark, towards 
the end of the third century, suffered martyrdom un- 
der Diocletian, in the year 303. He wrote commenta- 
ries on almost all the books of Scripture, of which only 
fragments remain. There is still extant a commentary 
on the Apocalypse ascribed to him. 



CHAPTER FIFTH. 

TESTIMONY FOR THE HISTORICAL BOOKS OF THE NEW 
TESTAMENT. 

Each book of the New Testament is a distinct work 
by itself; as to the examination of its claims each 
must stand independent of all the rest, and the evi- 
dence of each must be separately investigated. Before 
proceeding, however, to this individual examination, 
there are some general considerations which should be 
continually kept in mind. 

Those books, and those only, were regarded by the 
primitive Christians as a part of their New Testament 
canon which were written either by an apostle or by 
an associate of an apostle with apostolic superintend- 
ence and sanction. The authority of an inspired apos- 
tle was the only authority for a sacred book. 

The four Gospels which we have, and these only, 
have always been acknowledged and quoted by Chris- 
tians and heretics, Jews and pagans, as the authoritative 
books of the Christian church. Other gospels have ex- 
isted, and heretics have claimed for them equal or supe- 
rior authority to those which we regard as authentic ; 
but it has never been pretended that the Christian 
church has acknowledged any other gospels as canon- 
ical. 

Yery generally the Gospels have been arranged in 
the order in which we now have them, which is prob- 



142 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

ably the order of time in which thej were written ; but 
many ancient authorities put John immediately after 
Matthew, thus placing the two apostolic Gospels to- 
gether. 

The origin of the Gospels, according to the best- 
circumstantial evidence that we can obtain, seems 
to have been this: The apostles preached Christ, that 
is, they told their hearers who Christ was, what he 
had done, and taught, and suffered ; and explained 
the connection between the life and death of Jesus and 
the religious welfare of mankind. As was customary 
in ancient times, when books were rare and sold at an 
exorbitant price, many of their hearers took notes of 
their discourses, and sent copies of them to their 
friends. These notes, necessarily imperfect, without 
authority, and sometimes perhaps contradictory, were 
widely circulated. To prevent confusion and mistake 
the evangelists were divinely directed to write and 
publish authentic narratives, for the instruction of their 
contemporaries and posterity. 

Luke refers to these prior accounts, which had been 
written and circulated, in chapter i. v. 1, of his Gospel : 
"Forasmuch as many have taken in hand to set forth 
in order," etc. " Many " can not refer to Matthew and 
Mark, who had written before him ; for two could 
hardly be styled "many ; " and in verse 4, Luke says 
he wrote, that the "certainty," respecting the Saviour, 
might be known. Now if Matthew and Mark had 
been referred to in the word "many," there would 
have been no need of writing another account, as they 
were credible and inspired writers as well as Luke, 
and the "certainty" could have been learned from 
them as well as from him. 



HISTORICAL BOOKS OF THE N. TEST. 143 

The first three are called the Synoptic Gospels, because 
on account of their similarity, they can be taken 
together in one view and thus afford a sort of harmon- 
ized narrative of the life of Christ. 

Those books and those only were regarded by the 
primitive Christians as of canonical authority, which 
were written by apostles, or by the companions of the 
apostles under apostolic superintendence. 

The question in regard to the canonical authority 
of any book, therefore, was a question of simple fact, 
in respect to which the churches at that time had every 
opportunity of forming a correct judgment. Most of 
the churches were personally acquainted with several 
of the apostles ; and every one of the writers of the 
New Testament was personally known to many of the 
churches. 

The churches from which the books of the New 
Testament proceeded, were situated around the shores 
of the Mediterranean sea, from Egypt, through Pales- 
tine, Asia Minor and Greece, to Italy ; and through these 
countries, in consequence of the extensive military 
operations of the Roman empire and the roads estab- 
lished for the convenience of the soldiery, and the 
glory of Rome and the preservation of her power, 
communication was then easy and frequent. These 
churches were engaged in a great and common cause, 
in the prosecution of which they were obliged to en- 
counter obloquy and persecution of the severest kind ; 
and naturally they became strongly attached to each 
other, and the more intimately connected the more 
they were separated from the rest of the world. Thus 
we find them relieving each other's necessities by char- 



144 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

itable contributions (Acts xi. 29 ; 1 Cor. xvi. 1-3 ; 
2 Cor. viii. 1 ; Gal. ii. 10). Ministers and church mem- 
bers traveling, were recommended by one church to 
another: (Acts xviii. 27 ; Rom. xvi. 1, 2 ; 2 Cor. iii, 1 ; 
Col. iv. 10). Churches sent friendly salutations to one 
another (2 Cor. xiii. 1 ; Phil. iv. 22). Apostolic wri- 
tings were sent from one church to another (Col. iv.16). 

The churches so intimately connected, so frequently 
visited by different apostles, and teachers, and church 
members, and continually sending their sacred writings 
from one to another, could not be deceived as to what 
were apostolic books, and what were not. It would be 
perfectly easy to ascertain, in respect to any production, 
whether an apostle composed it or superintended its 
composition. If this were the case, the book was 
received as of canonical authority ; if not, its claims 
to such authority were rejected. 

It would have been impossible to impose upon 
these churches spurious books, as the writings of the 
apostles or apostolic men, during their lifetime, or the 
lifetime of the members of the churches who had been 
acquainted with them. Such deception, every one 
knows, would be impossible now. No one could write 
a letter to the churches of the United States or Great 
Britain, or any of the countries of Europe, and affix 
to it the name of any well known living preacher, as 
Spurgeon, or of one recently deceased, as bishop 
Whately, without exposing himself to immediate de- 
tection. Deception would have been equally impos- 
sible then ; for communication was then equally easy 
and frequent between the several places where churches 
were situated, and the connection between the churches 
was still more intimate then than it is now. 



HISTORICAL BOOKS OF THE N. TEST. 145 

The canonical books were kept in a sacred deposi- 
tory in the churches, as the manuscript rolls of the 
Old Testament are still kept by the Jews in their syn- 
agogues ; and they were read in course every Lord's 
day as a part of the regular religious service. Books 
written by those who were not apostles or apostolic 
deputies, as Clemens Romanus, Ignatius, Polycarp, and 
others, were also occasionally read in public on the 
Lord's day, for the instruction of the congregation ; 
as ministers now sometimes read occasional communica- 
tions from the pulpit. But the reading of these books 
did not make a part of the regular religious service, 
and they were not taken up till after the customary 
reading of the canonical Scriptures had closed.* 

The internal and circumstantial evidence confirms 
the judgment of the ancient churches respecting the 
canonical authority of these books. 

1. The contents of the books agree in every respect 
with what we know from other sources concerning the 
history of those times ; and nothing can be detected 
in them inconsistent with their claims to authenticity. 
They exhibit no marks of a later composition ; and 
the characteristic peculiarities of style by whieh the 
several books are distinguished from each other, give 
evidence of their genuineness. 

2. The dialect in which these books are written, is 
a convincing proof of their genuineness. They are 
written in a Hebraistic Greek, which was used chiefly 
by Jews of the first century, and went into very general 
disuse before the close of the third century. These 
books, then, if they are forgeries, must have been 

* Cave's Primitive Christianity, Part I. Chap. 9. 

10 



146 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

forged during the lives of the men to whom they are 
ascribed, or very soon after their death; and it is 
utterly incredible that such forgeries should ever have 
gained general credit. 

These books, if written by the apostles, or with apos- 
tolic superintendence and sanction, are worthy of be- 
lief, simply as books written by capable and honest 
men, setting aside all questions in regard to divine 
inspiration and authority. 

CREDIBILITY OF THE GOSPELS. 

I do not here touch the question of the inspiration 
or divine authority of the Gospels; but simply the 
credibility of the writers as men — as men capable and 
honest, or incapable and dishonest. Their claims to 
inspiration will be considered in another place. As 
evidence of their credibility we observe, 

1. They were well qualified to give testimony re- 
specting all the facts which they relate ; for three of 
them, Matthew, Mark, and John, were eyewitnesses of 
the transactions which they record, and Luke made 
himself acquainted with the facts by a diligent inves- 
tigation of the whole subject. Their manner of wri- 
ting, and all that we know respecting them, proves 
that they were men of capacity and discernment suffi- 
cient to make them competent judges of all the cir- 
cumstances which they relate. 

2. They give every proof of the most perfect sim- 
plicity and honesty. They impartially narrate their 
own faults and the faults of their brethren ; when, perse- 
cuted and defamed as they were, it would have been very 
natural for men in their situation to endeavor to palli- 



HISTORICAL BOOKS OF THE N. TEST. 147 

ate each other's failings. They expose all their own 
weaknesses ; when, if they had been impostors, it would 
have been greatly for their interest to have concealed 
them. They record with singular fidelity the severe 
rebukes which they received from their master for 
their timidity, forgetfulness, thoughtlessness and unbe- 
lief (compare Matt. xxvi. 69 ; Mark vi. 49-52 ; viii. 
14-21 ; Luke xxiv. 25, and many other passages). 
What stronger proof of honesty is it possible to 
require ? 

3. They changed their whole mode of life in con- 
sequence of their belief of the facts which they stated, 
and endured all manner of suffering in attestation of 
their truth. They themselves certainly believed that 
the things of which they testified, had actually oc- 
curred; and these facts were of such a nature, and 
such were the circumstauces of the case, that the wit- 
nesses could not have believed them, unless they had 
actually taken place. 

4. If their statements had not been true, the false- 
hood could have been easily detected ; — for they were 
continually surrounded by bitter enemies who were 
ceaselessly watchful to seize upon every advantage to 
hinder their progress. The Jews from all parts of the 
world were continually coming to Judea, with full op- 
portunity to learn everything that occurred there, and 
to report it when they returned to their homes. But 
the principal facts of the gospel history, instead of 
being denied, were admitted by its enemies ; and Judas 
himself, who had been intimate with the disciples, en- 
joyed their confidence, and partaken in all their coun- 
sels, and who had every inducement to excuse his own 



148 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

baseness by alleging crime against him whom he had 
betrayed, offered no such vindication of himself, but 
acknowledged that he had sinned and betrayed the 
innocent, and gave proof of the reality of his remorse 
and the depth of his wretchedness by violently destroy- 
ing his own life. What stronger testimony can we 
have to the innocency of Jesus and the integrity of 
the gospel history ? 

5. It is impossible that the character of Jesus should 
be a fiction, invented by such men as the writers of 
the New Testament. Their education, character, cir- 
cumstances, everything precludes the idea of their pos- 
sessing the ability or the inclination to conceive and 
delineate such a character, unless they had actually 
seen it exhibited before their eyes. Where in that 
corrupt age, where in all the history of the world, 
could they have found a model on which to form so 
grand, so perfect an idea ? And if a model, or even 
the nucleus of such a character, had existed, how were 
poor, unlettered publicans and fishermen to learn the 
skill to fashion and exhibit it with such beauty and 
effect ? 

A character possessing every virtue, without any of 
the corresponding failings, towards which, in imperfect 
human nature, each virtue leans — courage without 
rashness, humility without meanness, dignity without 
arrogance, perseverance without obstinacy, affection 
without weakness — always acting in exact consistency, 
and never ruffled by anger or depressed by despair, 
in all the severe and aggravating trials through which 
he passed. How could they draw such a character 
except from the living person ? And who could this 



HISTORICAL BOOKS OF THE N. TEST. 149 

person have been, if not he who came down from 
heaven ? How short was his stay upon earth ! scarcely 
three years of public life, and yet how glorious, how 
permanent the results! A world disenthralled, cor- 
rupting and debasing superstitions overthrown, men 
placed in circumstances of improvement by which they 
are continually advancing their social and public wel- 
fare; and now, nearly two thousand years after his 
death, while other founders of religious systems of 
more recent origin have already lost their hold on the 
human mind, the influence of Jesus of Nazareth is yet 
young and fresh, and more extensive and powerful than 
it has ever been before ; still increasing and strength- 
ening and brightening, evidently to go on till the affec- 
tions of every human heart shall be gained, and every 
tongue shall confess him Lord ! Has all this grown 
out of a fiction contrived by the poor fishermen of 
Galilee? 

Another consideration of great importance, to be 
taken in connection with the exalted moral perfection 
of Jesus, and the wonderful good sense which charac- 
terizes his teachings is the coolness and calmness and 
quiet assurance with which he makes the most astound- 
ing claims, which, if made by any human being would 
be absurd, revolting and preposterous in the extreme. 
For example, his discourse at Capernaum, John vi. 32 
-65, and also many other passages of similar import, 
necessarily imply that if Jesus were not the Divine 
Person he claimed to be, he was the most raving of 
fanatics, a supposition entirely inconsistent with the 
whole course of his life and every trait of his personal 
character. 



150 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

It is true that these expressions are metaphorical; 
but let us look at them closely. 

"Whoso eateth my flesh and drinkeih my blood, hath 
eternal life. 

For my flesh is meat indeed and my blood is drink 
indeed. He that eateth me, even he shall live by 
me." 

These metaphors are so strange, so uncouth, 
and so intensely abhor ent, especially to all Hebrew 
conceptions and ideas, that when used before a Jew- 
ish assembly by a teacher so sober, so clear-headed, 
so full of practical common sense as the Lord Jesus, 
and repeated over and over again in continuous sen- 
tences, notwithstanding the oifence which they very 
naturally gave, they certainly must indicate an idea 
utterly remote from the common range of human 
thought, unparalleled, and hitherto in human language 
unexpressed, — and all this occurs in the assertion of a 
claim peculiar to himself, a property which no other 
being in the universe, except himself, has or can have. 

CHARACTER OF THE GOSPELS. GENERAL REMARKS. 

One of the first remarks we make on examining the 
Four Gospels is, that while the first three have a strik- 
ing general resemblance to each other, the fourth is 
altogether peculiar, frequently in the substance of the 
narrative itself and always in the mode of narrating. 
So marked is this peculiarity of John, that the simple 
enunciation of a single sentence from his gospel strikes 
the ear in a way that precludes the possibility of refer- 
ring it to either of the other evangelists. 

Another thing which we notice is, that the several 



HISTORICAL BOOKS OF THE N. TEST.. 151 

evangelists, in narrating the same circumstance or 
reporting the same discourse, seldom or never employ 
exactly the same words; but rather give the sense 
in forms of expression slightly varied. To illus- 
trate this fact by a single example, take the sentence 
which was pronounced from heaven at the time of our 
Saviour's baptism. Matthew (iii. 17) gives it, "This is 
my beloved son, in whom I am well pleased ; " Mark 
(i. 11) "Thoa art my beloved son, in whom I am well 
pleased;" and Luke (iii. 22) u Thou art my beloved 
son, in thee I am well pleased." A like variation is 
often observable in the quotation of the same passage 
of the Old Testament by the different writers of the 
New. For example, compare Deut. viii. 3, andvi. 13, 
as quoted by Matthew (iv. 4, 10) and by Luke (iv. 
4, 8). In all these cases the sense is faithfully pre- 
served, but the phraseology is varied. The writers 
of the New Testament, indeed, never appear to aim 
at exact quotations of language, and provided the 
meaning is given, the mode of expression is regarded 
as of comparatively little importance. 

Two of the evangelists only, Matthew and Luke, 
give an account of the birth and childhood of Christ ; 
but all the four are very particular in their details 
respecting his death and resurrection ; for these were 
the great events on which the most important conse- 
quences depended. 

The most important fact, however, to be borne in 
mind in reading the Gospels, is, that they are neither 
histories nor full biographies, but simply scattered 
notices of transactions and discourses intended to illus- 
trate particular points in the character of Christ, and 



152 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

so arranged as to secure this purpose, but with little 
regard to the order of time. The evangelists disclaim 
all intention of writing complete and consecutive nar- 
ratives, and declare that their whole design is, by 
relating a few facts, to give such an impression respect- 
ing the character, teachings and works of Christ, as 
might induce men to receive him as the promised Mes- 
siah, the Saviour of the world (John xx. 30, 31 ; xxi. 
25). The evangelist here says, expressly, that he had 
taken but few facts from the whole number which had 
fallen under his notice, and that these had been selected 
with exclusive reference to the object above stated. 
We are not to look, therefore, for complete biography 
or chronological arrangement in the Gospels, but only 
for detached examples of the teachings and doings of 
Christ, suited to illustrate his character. 

The character of the Gospels in this respect can be 
easily illustrated by analogous examples from classical 
literature. After the death of Socrates, his disciples, 
Plato and Xenophon, undertook by their literary efforts 
to vindicate the character of their master from the 
aspersions cast upon it by his enemies. The work of 
Xenophon is divided into four books and subdivided 
into distinct topics. The topics of the first book are 
the following : 

L Socrates did not contemn the gods of his country, 
nor introduce new objects of worship. 

II. Socrates was not a corrupter of young men. 

III. What sort of man Socrates was, both in words 
and deeds, during his whole life. 

IY. How Socrates demonstrated the existence of 
God. 



HISTORICAL BOOKS OF THE N. TEST. 153 

V. How Socrates discoursed on temperance. 

VI. Disputation of Socrates with Antiphon the 
sophist. 

VII. How Socrates dissuaded men from arrogance. 
Each of these topics is illustrated by anecdotes 

respecting Socrates, and by reports of conversations 
which he had with different persons, bearing on the 
several points ; and these are thrown together in the 
manner best suited to illustrate the different topics, 
without regard to the order of time in which the trans- 
actions or conversations actually took place, and with- 
out any endeavor to preserve the appearance of con- 
tinuity of narrative. Accordingly, this work is never 
regarded as a biography of Socrates, and is always 
referred to under the appellation of memoirs or memo- 
rabilia. Its Greek title anofivtjfiopevfiaTa (apomnemoneu- 
mata) is applied by Justin Martyr to the Gospels, and 
with great propriety, for they are works of precisely 
the same kind. 

An examination of the Gospel of Matthew will show 
that it is constructed on a plan very similar to that of 
Xenophon's Memorabilia of Socrates. After a brief 
notice of the birth and childhood of Jesus (i. ii.) and 
his entrance on his public ministry (iii. iv.), Matthew 
proceeds to show what Christ was as a public teacher 
of religion, and gives an adequate example of the 
nature of his instructions and his mode of communi- 
cating them, by reporting at considerable length the 
substance of his sermon on the mount (v.-vii.). I 
say the substance of the sermon, for it is evident that 
Matthew does not give the whole discourse word for 
word as it was uttered, from the fact that Luke, who 



154 THE BOOKS OF THE BIELE. 

in a briefer abstract of the same sermon (vi. 20-49), 
has yet inserted some things omitted by Matthew, aa 
for example the three woes corresponding to the bea- 
titudes (Luke vi. 25). 

Matthew next exhibits Christ as a worker of mira- 
cles, and collects into one connected view several mira- 
cles of different kinds, wrought in various places and 
at different times, for the purpose of showing what 
Christ was in reference to the exercise of miraculous 
powers (viii. ix.). 

He afterwards exhibits Christ in another view, as a 
teacher by parables, and collects together several dif- 
ferent parables as a specimen of this most interesting 
mode of teaching (xiii.). 

Thus throughout his Gospel, Matthew does not fol- 
low any chronological series of events or instructions, 
but groups together things of the same kind, and shows 
by a series of living pictures, what Christ was in all 
the various circumstances through which he passed. 
This mode of writing was chosen by him for the same 
reason that it had been before by Xenophon, because 
it was the best adapted to the particular purpose he 
had in view, which was to vindicate the character of 
Christ before his countrymen, and set it in its true 
light. 

Christ had been the great moral teacher and bene- 
factor of his nation. He had been undervalued, slan- 
dered, and persecuted all his life, and was at last un- 
justly doomed to a cruel death, attended with all the 
circumstances of indignity and shame, which could be 
brought together to blast his reputation and throw a 
shade over the splendor of his exalted virtues. Mat- 



HISTORICAL BOOKS OF THE N. TEST. 155 

thew, his disciple, like Xenophon, the disciple of Soc- 
rates, knew and could appreciate his master's worth ; 
and by a simple detail of what he did and said in vari- 
ous circumstances and on different topics, sought to 
disarm the prejudices of his countrymen, and bring 
them to see what sort of a man he was, whom their 
rulers with ivicked hands had crucified and slain. 

After these general remarks we shall now turn our 
attention to the particular circumstances of each one 
of the evangelists, the special object each had in view 
while writing, the distinguishing peculiarities of each 
one of the several Gospels, and especially the precise 
grounds of evidence on which each of these books 
stands before us in the Bible. 

For a knowledge of these particulars we must rely 
mainly on incidental and brief hints scattered through 
the New Testament ; for the evangelists never make 
themselves prominent in their narratives, nor give any 
details respecting their personal history and circum- 
stances. They preach not themselves, but Christ Jesus 
the Lord. 

The genuineness of the books of the New Testa- 
ment is a question simply of historical fact, nothing 
more nor less, and like every other question of fact, is 
to be ascertained and determined by testimony, by the 
testimony of independent and credible witnesses, and 
this testimony not contradicted, but confirmed and 
sustained by the internal evidence. We have already 
shown in a preceding chapter, that the testimony of 
the early Christians, to their own sacred books, is 
at least as good and worthy of belief as any hu- 
man testimony ; and that if the facts in regard to 



156 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

their books can not be established by their testi- 
mony, no facts of secular history can ever be estab- 
lished by any human testimony whatever. Before 
proceeding to the examination of each one of the his- 
torical books of the New Testament, we wish to give 
some general idea of the state of the testimony in 
regard to them during the first four centuries. We 
must remember that the great majority of the writers 
of this early period have gone into oblivion, their 
writings have perished, and the witnesses whom we 
can call are but the few survivors of an immense ship- 
wreck. We will cite the principal witnesses by name ; 
and refer the reader to the preceding chapter for a 
brief biography of the witnesses cited, which will show 
their value as witnesses by a statement in regard to 
their character and their qualifications to give testi- 
mony on this particular point. 

For the first three, or the synoptical Gospels in con- 
nection, we call as witnesses, three of the personal 
friends and associates of the apostle Paul — to wit, Bar- 
nabas, Clement of Rome (Phil. iv. 3), Hernias (Rom. 
xvi. 14), and also Ignatius and Polycarp, the friends 
and associates of the apostle John, five good witnesses. 

For the four Gospels in connection, the witnesses 
are Polycarp, Papias, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Tatian, 
Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian, Origen, 
Dionysius of Alexandria, Eusebius, Epiphanius, and 
Jerome — thirteen witnesses, ten of them not cited 
before. 

To the Gospel of Matthew individually, Papias, Jus- 
tin Martyr, Hegesippus, Irenaeus, Tatian, Athenagoras, 
Theophilus, Pantaenus, Clement of Alexandria, Ter- 



HISTORICAL BOOKS OF THE N. TEST. 157 

tullian, Julius Africanus, Origen, Eusebius, Cyrill of 
Jerusalem, Epiphanius, Jerome — seventeen witnesses, 
five of them not cited before. 

To the Gospel of Mark individually, Papias, Justin 
Martyr, Irenaeus, Athenagoras, Clement of Alexandria, 
Tertullian, Origen, Eusebius, Epiphanius, Jerome — ten 
witnesses. 

To the Gospel of Luke individually, Justin Martyr, 
the Church of Vienne and Lyons in France, Irenaeus, 
Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexan- 
dria, Tertullian, Julius Africanus, Origen, Eusebius, 
Epiphanius, Jerome — thirteen witnesses, one not cited 
before. 

To the Gospel of John individually, Barnabas, Her- 
nias, Clement of Rome, Ignatius, Justin Martyr, Church 
of Vienne and Lyons, Irenaeus, Polycrates, Tatian, 
Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria, Ter- 
tullian, Origen, Dionysius of Alexandria, Eusebius, 
Dorotheus, Victorinus, Epiphanius, Jerome — twenty 
witnesses, four not previously cited. 

Witnesses to the book of Acts, Barnabas, Clement 
of Rome, Ignatius, Polycarp, Papias, Dionysius of 
Corinth, Justin Martyr, Church of Yienne and Lyons, 
Irenaeus, Tatian, Athenagoras, Clement of Alexandria, 
Tertullian, Origen, Eusebius, Jerome — fifteen witnesses, 
and one which has not been cited before. 

Beside these witnesses, who all belonged to the 
Christian church, we have some valuable testimony 
which is anonymous, as that of the Epistle to Diogne- 
tus ; and also other very important testimony, all cor- 
roborating the witnesses belonging to the church, from 
heretics and pagans and Jews. 



158 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Before proceeding any further, let the reader now 
turn to the biographical chapter (chapter fourth) and 
judge for himself whether any ancient books whatever 
have anything like the amount of unexceptionable tes- 
timony in their favor which we here adduce in favor 
of the historical books of the New Testament ; and the 
other books will be found equally well sustained when 
we come to discuss them. 

It is sometimes objected that these witnesses simply 
copy from one another, and that accordingly the testi- 
, mony of ten or a dozen is no more than the testimony 
of one or two. To this we answer, first, that the state- 
ment is a mere assumption of the objector without any 
positive evidence in its favor whatever. The objec- 
tion, as used in this discussion, is wholly the offspring 
of the imagination and has no historical basis to rest 
upon. Moreover, the objection is in itself altogether 
improbable. But very few out of hundreds and thou- 
sands of witnesses have come down to our time. The 
others have been buried under the ruins of past ages. 
To assume, then, that the witnesses which still survive 
of the second and third, and subsequent ages of the 
church, were taught exclusively by those few who still 
survive to our time of the first age of the church, and 
not by any of those who have now passed into ob- 
livion, is to assume that which is on the very face of 
it an entire absurdity. The witnesses which we cite 
from each of the primitive ages of the church had the 
use of all the witnesses who had preceded them, and 
who are now unknown. 

That we do not overstate the number of witnesses 
is evident from the pagan writers themselves. Tacitus 



HISTORICAL BOOKS OF THE N. TEST. 159 

(Annal. xv. 44) says that the Christians in Rome, dur- 
ing the reign of Nero, and the life time of the apos- 
tles, A. D. 64, were already a " vast multitude " ; Pliny, 
of the next generation, A. D. 112, in his letter to Tra- 
jan, gives a similar account of their great numbers in 
the remote province of Bithynia ; while the Christian 
writers Irenaeus (Adv. Haer. i. 10) and Tertullian 
(Adv. Jud. c. 7) from A. D. 150 to 180 represent 
their believing brethren as thickly scattered over the 
whole known world, both civilized and barbarian. 
At the very time of the composition of the Christian 
Scriptures, or within one generation thereafter, there 
were Christian churches in every part of the world ; 
and every church had its elders, (Titus i. 5) educated 
for their work, and fully competent to form a correct 
judgment in regard to their sacred books. 

The witnesses of each of the primitive ages took 
the best matured results of their own time, and their 
matured results were drawn from hundreds of original 
and credible witnesses then well known, but since lost, 
as well as from the very few who yet survive. None 
of them depended exclusively on the dozen or twenty 
which we have, and who have outlived the ruins of 
the past. 

All human testimony, even the best, is liable to 
error, and some witnesses are much more worthy of 
credit than others. We do not require that the testi- 
mony of every or any witness be received as infallible, 
nor that there should be no discrimination among the 
witnesses. We ask only that this testimony be treated 
just like all other human testimony ; and be received 
as substantially correct, unless there be sufficient cir- 



160 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

cumstantial or other evidence to contradict it, or unless 
the character of the witness himself be proved to be 
justly liable to suspicion. Let it be fully understood 
that we do not profess in any case to cite all the wit- 
nesses who are still extant ; but only those whose tes- 
timony is the most full and the most easily accessible. 
With these preliminary remarks on the nature and ex- 
tent of the evidence given, we proceed to the discus- 
sion of each one of the individual books of the New 
Testament, beginning, as a matter of course, with the 
historical books in their usual order. 



CHAPTER SIXTH. 

THE FOUR GOSPELS SEPARATELY EXAMINED. 
MATTHEW. 

Matthew was a Galilean Jew, and held the office 
of a receiver of customs under the Roman govern- 
ment, at the sea of Tiberias, near Capernaum (Matt. 
ix. 9). By Mark he is called Levi, son of Alpheus 
(Mark ii. 14). When a Jew became a Roman citizen 
he generally assumed a Roman name ; and it is proba- 
ble that Levi was the original Hebrew, and Matthew 
the assumed Roman name of this evangelist. He left 
his business at the call of Christ, and became his per- 
manent attendant and one of the twelve apostles a 
short time before the delivery of the sermon on the 
mount (Luke v. 27). In enumerating the apostles he 
calls himself Matthew the publican (Matt. x. 9) or 
customhouse officer, a name exceedingly odious to the 
oppressed Jews. 

The nature of the publican's office, and the injus- 
tice and oppression which these officers generally prac- 
tised, were enough to excite odium in a nation less sen- 
sitive than the Jewish. When the Romans subjugated 
the Jews, they treated them as they did other con- 
quered nations, that is, they required of every man, 
in addition to various taxes, the payment of an annual 
tribute, as a token of his subjection and for the support 
11 



162 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

of the dignity of the Roman empire. This tribute 
was extremely hateful to the Jews, who boasted that 
they had no sovereign but God, that they were Abra- 
ham's seed, and were not in bondage to any man. 
But oppressive as this tax was in itself, it often became 
still more so by the manner in which it was collected. 
It was customary for the government to expose 
the taxes of a province to sale, and he who would 
offer the most for them had the privilege of col- 
lecting ; and all that he could obtain above the amount 
paid to the government, went to enrich himself. 
Those who had thus taken the taxes of a whole pro- 
vince, would divide the province into districts, and 
expose them to sale in the same manner ; and often 
the district would be subdivided and sold again ; so 
that sometimes three or four different sets of extor- 
tioners were to be enriched out of the surplus tribute 
money of the people, above that which went into the 
public treasury. As the right of collecting was fre- 
quently sold from one to another at an increasing price, 
it was for the interest of the publican to extort as 
much as possible ; and as the general government par- 
ticipated with the publicans in their plunder, it was 
for their interest to listen to no complaint against the 
collectors of their revenue. There was scarcely a pos- 
sibility of redress in case of wrong ; and if one refused 
to submit to injustice, frequently by false accusation he 
was robbed of his whole property (compare Luke iii. 
12-14; xix. 1-10). It is no wonder then, that the 
very name of publican became odious, and synony- 
mous with that of sinner ; though doubtless there were 
some who performed the duties of this office in an 
honorable and conscientious manner. 



THE FOUR GOSPELS. 163 

It is the unanimous testimony of the ancients, that 
Matthew wrote his Gospel for the use of the Jewish 
Christians of Palestine ; and this testimony is confirmed 
by internal evidence. The writer everywhere takes 
it for granted, that his readers are well acquainted 
with the geography of Palestine ; and he does not 
consider it necessary to explain any of the Jewish 
customs to which he alludes. The considerations, 
which he adduces to prove the Messiahship of Jesus, 
are such as would have most weight with Jews. He 
traces the genealogy of Christ from his reputed father 
through David to Abraham ; and takes particular pains 
to show how the prophecies of the Old Testament were 
fulfilled in Jesus of Nazareth. Compare i. 23 ; ii. 6, 
15, 18; iii. 3; iv. 14; viii. 17; xii. 17; xiii. 35; xxi. 
4 ; xxvi. 56 ; xxvii. 9. Indeed it is the leading object 
of his Gospel to prove that Jesus is the Messiah spoken 
of by the prophets, an argument which at that time 
Jews only could appreciate. 

The testimony is just as unanimous and unequivocal 
that Matthew originally wrote his Gospel in Hebrew 
as it is that he wrote a Gospel at all. This will be 
seen in the citations of witnesses which we shall soon 
give. And if he wrote for the use of the Hebrews in 
Palestine previous to the destruction of Jerusalem, , as 
all agree, there was an absolute necessity that he 
should write in Hebrew. By Hebrew is here meant the 
Syro-Chaldaic or Aramaen dialect spoken at that time 
by the Jews in their own land. This in the New Tes- 
tament is called Hebrew (Acts xxi. 40 ; xxii. 2), and 
though not the pure ancient Hebrew, it is as much like 
it as the English of the present day is like the English 



164 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

of the Reformation period. It is the language in 
which Christ usually conversed while on earth, as is 
seen from such passages as Mark v. 41 ; vii. 34 ; xv. 
24 ; Matt, xxvii. 46. The Jews tenaciously held on 
to this their national tongue, using Greek only from 
absolute necessity ; and Paul greatly conciliated a Je- 
rusalem mob simply by addressing them in their native 
Hebrew (Acts xxi. 40 ; xxii. 2). When Paul on this 
occasion asked permission of the chief captain to ad- 
dress the multitude, that officer expressed his surprise 
that he found the apostle so well acquainted with the 
Greek language (Acts xxi. 37, 38). Josephus was a 
Jew of high rank, born about the time when Matthew 
first wrote his Gospel, and received the best education 
which Palestine could then give to her most favored 
sons, and he gives the following most explicit testimo- 
ny on this point. Antiq. XX. xi. 2. U I have taken 
great pains to acquire the Greek learning, and to un- 
derstand the elements of the Greek language, though 
I have so long accustomed myself to speak our own 
tongue, that I can not pronounce Greek with sufficient 
exactness; for our nation does not encourage those 
that learn the languages of many nations." Again in 
his preface to the same work, sec. 2, he says "it is a 
difficult thing to translate our history (the Jewish) 
into a foreign and to us unaccustomed language " (the 
Greek). 

This being the case, (and who can contradict the 
testimony of Josephus on such a point ?) if Matthew 
cherished any expectation of being read by his own 
countrymen, he must have addressed them in their own 
language. 

How happens it then that there has been preserved 



THE FOUR GOSPELS. 165 

in the church a Greek Gospel of Matthew and no He- 
brew one ? The ancients assign two dates to the com- 
position of Matthew's Gospel, one from A. D. 40 
to 45, the other from the year 60 to 65. The infer- 
ence is quite obvious that he wrote his Gospel twice, 
and the reason for this is very plain. After the over- 
throw of Jerusalem the Jews were dispersed and 
ceased to speak their own language, and the Greek 
became their usual tongue, as Hebrew had been before. 
Matthew, then, foreseeing this exigency, as the time 
drew near, prepared for them his Greek Gospel, and 
there being no further use for the Hebrew one it grad- 
ually disappeared ; though Jerome affirms that he had 
not only seen it, in the famous library of Pamphilus at 
Cassarea, but actually himself translated it into Greek 
and Latin. 

Among the manuscripts brought to the British Mu- 
seum in 1842, there is a very ancient Syrian Matthew, 
which Dr. Cureton has published, and which he sup- 
poses, not without some reason, to be the original 
Hebrew Matthew. It differs from our Greek Matthew 
only in phraseology here and there. The following is 
a specimen of the variations ; 

Greek. Syrian. 

i. 20, He shall save his peo- He shall save the world 

pie from their sins. from its sins. 

i. 23, God with us. Our God with us. 

i. 25, knew her not. dwelt with her in purity, 

vii. 5, hypocrite. accepter of persons. 

xv. 22, grievously demon- badly conducted by a 

ized. devil's hand, 

xvi. 19, the keys of the the keys of the gates of 

kingdom. the kingdom. 



166 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Our present Greek is no translation, but an original 
from Matthew's own hand ; and we have the evidence 
entirely satisfactory of a Hebrew Gospel of his, writ- 
ten some twenty years earlier, and indispensible to Mat- 
thew's purpose of introducing the life of Christ to his 
own countrymen. The Hebrew Gospel, as we are in- 
formed by Eusebius (E. H. v. 10), was found among 
the Christians in India in the latter part of the second 
century, by Pantaenus, the missionary and philosopher, 
who afterwards with so much celebrity presided over 
the catechetic school at Alexandria. He testifies that 
the book was carried thither by the apostle Bartholo- 
mew, who first preached the Gospel in those regions. 
According to the testimony of antiquity, which there 
is no ground for contradicting, the Hebrew Matthew 
was the first of the four Gospels that was written. 
Eusebius says that after our Lord's ascension Matthew 
preached in Judea, (for fifteen years, adds Clement of 
Alexandria,) and then went to foreign nations. He 
is said to have visited Ethiopia, Persia and Parthia, 
and to have died a martyr's death. 

Matthew may be styled a plain, matter of fact writer ; 
and the habits of his mind are evidently those of a 
man of business rather than study. He exhibits Christ 
mostly in his earthly character and relations ; as a law- 
giver, promulgating the new dispensation from the 
mount, as Moses did the old from Sinai ; as a worker 
of miracles and a teacher. ^Because he thus treated 
of Christ in his earthly employments and human char- 
acter, his Gospel was by the ancients called o^o.ti%ov 
(somatikon) or the bodily Gospel. 

He is very brief in narrative, disregarding almost 



THE FOUR GOSPELS. 167 

entirely the order of time, but particular in his reports 
of the discourses and parables of our Lord, and gen- 
erally he gives only just enough of the narrative to 
introduce the discourse. In this respect/ as well as in 
some others, his Gospel bears a striking resemblance to 
the work of Xenophon alluded to above. 

Indeed, there is the same sort of difference between 
the accounts of Jesus Christ as given by Matthew and 
John, that we find between the accounts of Socrates 
as given by Xenophon and Plato. 

TESTIMONIES TO MATTHEW. 

In all cases, in examining the testimonies cited, the 
reader is requested to turn to the name of each wit- 
ness, in chap, fourth, and ascertain his qualifications to 
give testimony, as there stated. It is also to be noted 
that much of this testimony is given incidentally, and is 
all the more valuable on that account ; that is, it is not 
expressly stated always that such an author wrote such 
a book, but there is a quotation from the book, or an 
allusion to some statement in it, which shows that the 
witness read the same book in the same way that we 
now read it, and assigned it to the same author. It is 
further to be observed that the ancients quote the New 
Testament very much as the New Testament writers 
quote the Old Testament, seldom with literal exactness, 
quite freely, often giving the sense only without regard 
to the exact words, as though they quoted from mem- 
ory simply, as doubtless they often did. 

The most important witnesses for Matthew are Pa- 
pias, Ignatius, Justin Martyr, Hegesippus, Letter to 
Diognetus, Irenaeus, Tatian, Pantaenus, Clement of 



168 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Alexandria, Tertullian, Origen, Eusebius, Cyrill of Je- 
rusalem, Epiphanius, Jerome, Julius Africanus. 

As introductory to the quotations which will be 
made from the ancient witnesses in behalf of the Gos- 
pels, we commend to the reader's attention the follow- 
ing paragraphs from Dean Stanley : 

" Irenaeus and Tertullian were two writers in the last 
quarter of the second century ; the former had spent 
his youth among the churches of Asia Minor, and had 
migrated among the Christians of Gaul ; the latter was 
a presbyter in the Latin church of North Africa. Both 
were strong traditionists ; and both distinctly appeal 
to the four canonical Gospels by name. But would 
churches so widely remote as those of Smyrna, Car- 
thage, and Lyons, with one accord receive as Scripture 
four books which were only a few years old ? And 
besides, Irenaeus had been in his youth a companion 
of Polycarp, the disciple of St. John. Is it credible 
that St. John's Gospel could have been received by 
him if it had been never heard of till A. D. 150? 
Moreover, about A. D. 150, Celsus quotes both the 
synoptical Gospels and St. John, and says, ' all this I 
have taken out of your own Scriptures.' About the 
same date, Theophilus and Tatian both constructed a 
Harmony of the Four Gospels ; and ten years earlier 
still, Justin Martyr speaks of Gospels written by the 
apostles and their companions ; meaning, there can 
surely be little question, the four as we now have them. 
Twenty years before that, Polycarp uses St. Matthew, 
and quotes the first Epistle of St. John, which is allowed 
on all hands to be (under any supposition) by the same 
author as the Gospel. And about the same period, 



THE FOUR GOSPELS. 169 

Papias, a bishop in Asia Minor, who tells us he took 
particular pains to collect oral information from survi- 
vors who had known the apostles, describes how Mat- 
thew wrote originally in Hebrew, and how Mark drew 
his materials from St. Peter. The passage is but a 
fragment preserved in Eusebius, so that no sound argu- 
ment against St. John can be drawn e silentio, any 
more than against St. Paul or St. Luke. Thus we are 
brought down to about A. D. 100, without a trace of 
any conciliar action, or of any controversy on the sub- 
ject which can not easily be explained. The church 
emerges from the first century with the sacred book 
of the four Gospels in her hand. The very earliest 
apocryphal Gospels only attempt to fill up the blanks 
in their narrative, and never give a competing account. 
The most ancient of all was held by Jerome, who 
translated it, to be the Hebrew original of St. Mat- 
thew. The Montanists, in their wildest hatred of St. 
John's Gospel, could only attribute it to his contempo- 
rary Cerinthus. And every recent discovery, such as 
the missing end of the Clementine Homilies (contain- 
ing a quotation from St. John), and the original Greek 
of Barnabas (giving St. Matthew's Gospel the honora- 
ble title of l Scripture '), only tends to corroborate the 
proof, that we have in the four Gospels the primitive 
records of Christianity, and a trustworthy means for 
understanding what the mind and the preaching of the 
apostles really were."* 

We subjoin a specimen of the kind of testimony 
which the ancient witnesses give in respect to Matthew : 

*This argument is well drawn out in Teschendorf's pamphlet, 
" Wann wurden unsere Evangelien verfasst ? " 



170 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Papias : " Matthew set forth his oracles in the He- 
brew dialect, which every one interpreted as he was 
able." Euseb. Hist. Ecc. iii. 39. 

Irenaeus : "Matthew put forth the writing of the 
Gospel among the Hebrews in their dialect." Adv. 
Haer, iii. ; Euseb. Hist. Ecc. v. 8. 

Jerome: ''Matthew, first in Judea, on account of 
those from the circumcision who believed, composed 
the Gospel of Christ in Hebrew letters and words." 
Catal. c. 4. "Matthew published a Gospel in Judea 
in the Hebrew language." Proleg. in Matth. 

Eusebius : "Matthew, having first proclaimed his 
Gospel to the Hebrews .... committed it to writing 
in his native tongue." Ecc. Hist. iii. 23. 

Epiphanius : " They indeed (the Ebionites) receive 
the Gospel according to Matthew ; for this both they 
use and also the Cerinthians. They call it indeed the 
Gospel according to the Hebrews ; as it is true to say, 
that Matthew alone in the New Testament made the 
declaration and preaching of the Gospel in Hebrew 
and with Hebrew letters." Haeres. xxx. 3. 

Clement of Alexandria : " Matthew having first pro- 
claimed the Gospel in Hebrew, when on the point of 
going also to other nations, committed it to writing in 
his native tongue." Euseb. E. H. iii. 24. 

Origen : " The first (Gospel) is written according to 
Matthew, the same that was once a publican but after- 
wards an apostle of Christ, who having published it 
for the Jewish converts, wrote it in the Hebrew." 
Euseb. E. H. vi. 25. 

Ignatius : " How then was he manifested to the 
ages ? A star shone in heaven, in splendor excelling 



THE FOUR GOSPELS. 171 

all the other stars, and its brightness was ineffable, and 
the strangeness of it inspired terror." Matth. ii. ; 
Ephes. xix. 

Barnabas already in his time quotes Matthew as 
Scripture, Epist. chap. iv. " As it is written many are 
called but few chosen." Matth. xx. 16; xxii. 14. 
Again, chap. v. "He did not come to call the right- 
eous but sinners to repentance." Matth. ix. 13. 

Justin Martyr : " The discourses of Christ were 
brief and compendious, for he was no sophist,. but his 
word was the power of God. Concerning chastity he 
said this: Whosoever looketh on a woman to lust 
after her hath committed adultery with her already in 
his heart before .God. Also, If thy right eye offend 
thee, cut it out, for it is profitable for thee with one 
eye to enter into the kingdom of God, rather than 
with two eyes to be sent into eternal fire. Also, He 
who marries a woman repudiated by another man com- 
mits adultery. Also, There are some who are made 
eunuchs by man, and there are some who are born 
eunuchs, and some who make themselves eunuchs for 
the kingdom of heavens's sake ; but not all receive 
this." See Matth. v. 28, 29, 32 ; xviii. 9 ; xix. 11, 12. 
Apol. i. p. 21. 

" Christ called not the just and the chaste to repent- 
ance, but the impious, the incontinent and the unjust, 
for thus he said, I came not to call the righteous, but 
sinners to repentance." Matth. ix. 13. Apol. i. p. 22. 

"He cured all sickness and all disease." Matth. iv* 
23. Apol. i. p. 50. 

"At that time some coming to him asked him if it 
were proper to pay tribute to Cassar, and he answered, 



172 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Tell me, whose image hath the coin ? and they say 
Caesar's ; and again he answered them, render there- 
fore to Caesar the things that be Caesar's, and to God the 
things that are God's." Matth. xxii. 15-21. Apol. i. 
p. 26. 

u He (John) seated by the river Jordan cried, I indeed 
baptize you with water unto repentance, but there will 
come one mightier than I, whose shoes I am not wor- 
thy to bear, he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost 
and with fire, whose fan is in his hand, and he will 
thoroughly purge his floor, and his wheat he will 
gather into his garner, but he will burn up the chaff 
with unquenchable fire." Matth. iii. 11 ? 12. Dialogue 
with Trypho p. 268-9. 

In the few works of Justin which remain to us there 
are from 50 to 75 quotations of this kind from the 
Gospel of Matthew. 

Epistle to Diognetus : u Christ taught that we should 
not be anxious (take no thought) about food and rai- 
ment." Matth. vi. 25. 

Tatian : " The Saviour said it is not proper to lay 
up treasure on earth where moth and rust corrupteth." 
Matth. vi. 19. Clem. Alex. Strom, iii. p. 463. 

Athenagoras ; "I say to you love your enemies, bless 
them that curse you, pray for them that persecute you, 
that you may be the children of your Father who is 
in heaven, who causeth his sun to rise on the evil and 
on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the 
unjust." Matth. v. 44, 45. Legat. p. 11. 

Theophilus : " Thus he teaches those that do good 
not to boast, that they be not pleasers of men. Let 
not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth." 
Matth. vi. 4. Autol. p. 126. 



THE FOUR GOSPELS. 173 

Pantaenus : "To whom (the inhabitants of India) 
Bartholomew, one of the twelve apostles, preached, 
and left them the writings of Matthew in Hebrew let- 
ters, which is preserved to this day." Euseb. E. H. 
v. 10. 

Clement of Alexandria : " But in the Gospel accord- 
ing to Matthew the genealogy which begins with Abra- 
ham terminates with Mary the mother of the Lord, 
For there are, he says, from Abraham to David, four- 
teen generations, and from David to the carrying away 
into Babylon, fourteen generations, and from the car- 
rying away into Babylon until Christ, there are like- 
wise fourteen other generations." Matth. i. 17 Strom. 
i. p. 341. 

Tertullian: "In the outset Matthew himself, that 
most faithful reporter of the Gospel, as companion of 
the Lord, for no other reason than that he might make 
us acquainted with the carnal origin of Christ, thus 
begins, The book of the generation of Jesus Christ, 
the son of David, the son of Abraham. De Carne 
Christi, c. 22. 

"Matthew, bringing the origin of the Lord from 
Abraham to Mary, says, Jacob begat Joseph the hus- 
band of Mary, from whom Christ was born." id. c. 20. 

The genuineness of the first two chapters of Mat- 
thew has by some been called in question, but un- 
doubtedly on doctrinal grounds, solely for the sake of 
getting rid of the narrative of the miraculous birth of 
Christ, and not for any historical reason whatever. 
The earliest testimony, as given above, is just as clear 
and positive to these two chapters as to any other part 
of the book, and the most critical examination of the 



174 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. . 

language and style has failed to produce any result 
unfavorable to the authorship of Matthew. See above, 
Ignatius, Irenaeus, Tertullian, Clement of Alexandria, 
Epiphanius, Julius Africanus, and others. 

Irenaeus : " But again Matthew speaking concerning 
the angel, says, The angel of the Lord appeared 
to Joseph in a dream. Of what Lord he himself inter- 
prets : That it might be fulfilled which was spoken of 
the Lord by the prophet, Out of Egypt have I called 
my son. Therefore a virgin shall conceive in the 
womb and shall bring forth a son, and shall call his 
name Jesus, which is interpreted, God with us." Adv. 
Haer. iii. 9. 

Cyril of Jerusalem : " Matthew writing a Gospel 
wrote it in the Hebrew tongue." Catech. xiv. 

Epiphanius : " Wherefore indeed this Matthew also 
writes the Gospel in Hebrew letters and preaches, and 
begins not at the beginning, but derives the genealogy, 
indeed from Abraham." Matth. i. 1, 2. Haeres. li. 

Jerome : " Concerning the New Testament I now 
speak, that doubtless it is Greek, the apostle Matthew 
being excepted, who first in Judea gave out the Gos- 
pel of Christ in Hebrew letters." Praefat in iv. Evang. 
ad Dam. 

Julius Africanus. This writer gives an elaborate 
statement of the different genealogies of Christ as they 
stand in Matthew and Luke, and proposes an ingenious 
method of reconciling them. It is perfectly certain 
that he used the same first chapter of Matthew which 
is found in our own Greek Testaments. 

Here are a very few of the testimonies which we 
have in the earliest ages to the existence of Matthew's 



THE FOUR GOSPELS. 175 

Gospel, and as we now have it. We give less than a 
tithe of what might be adduced even from the scanty 
remains, which have escaped the ravages of time, of 
the primitive Christian literature. But the evidence, 
even from this source, that there was from the first a 
Gospel of Matthew, and that this Gospel, whether He- 
brew or Greek, in fact both, was the same Gospel 
which we now have under Matthew's name, is beyond 
controversy. 

GOSPEL OF MARK. 

Mark was the son of a pious woman in Jerusalem, 
and the intimate friend of the apostle Peter (Acts xii. 
12 ; 1 Pet. v. 13). He was also the friend and com- 
panion of Paul (Acts xii. 25 ; xiii. 5), till some neg- 
lect of his, which occasioned a misunderstanding be- 
tween Paul and Barnabas respecting him, produced a 
separation (Acts. xv. 36-41). Paul afterwards became 
reconciled to him, perhaps when he met him at Rome 
in company with Peter, and speaks of him in several 
of his epistles with great confidence and affection 
(Col. iv. 10; 2 Tim. iv. 11; Philemon 24). 

According to the almost unanimous testimony of 
antiquity, his Gospel was written at Rome, under the 
superintendence of the apostle Peter, a little after that 
of Matthew, and it was intended for the instruction of 
the. Roman converts from paganism. To this, internal 
evidence corresponds. 

He has many pure Latin words written in Greek let- 
ters, where the other evangelists use the appropriate 
Greek words. 

For example xevrvgicov (kenturiori) the Latin centurio 
instead of the Greek UaTovTaox^g (Jiekatontarches) cen- 
turion, xv. 39, 45, 35. Compare also xii. 42. 



176 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Again, ansxovlaTtaq the Latin speculator, executioner, 
vi. 27. 

The Latin phrases wxfocog i x n (eschatos echei) and 
to txavdp notfpat, to ikanon ypoiesai, v. 23 ; xv. 15. 

The above purely Latin words and phrases, instead 
of the corresponding Greek, are used by Mark and 
Mark only of all the writers of the New Testament. 

But why if he wrote for the Romans, did he not 
write in Latin instead of Greek ? 

It is evident from the statements of Tacitus, Martial, 
Juvenal, and the very inscriptions on the Roman tomb- 
stones, that Greek was generally understood and used 
at Rome during this period, and probably the children 
universally, when taught to read at all, were taught 
to read Greek. The emperors themselves, as Marcus 
Antoninus, when they became authors, wrote in Greek. 
Classic authors residing at Rome, and writing to Ro- 
mans, as Epictetus, Plutarch, Polybius, Josephus, wrote 
in Greek. Justin Martyr, residing at Rome and ad- 
dressing his two apologies to the Roman emperors, 
wrote them both in Greek. So of the Christian wri- 
ters generally. Irenaeus, Clement of Rome, Hermas, 
and others, living in the Latin empire and writing for 
Latins as well as Greeks, used the Greek tongue as 
the dialect most generally accessible as the language 
of books. It is no wonder, then, that Mark, residing 
at Rome and writing for Romans, should write in 
Greek, nor that his composition should be characterized 
by Latin words and idioms. 

He carefully explains allusions to Jewish customs, as 
if writing for those who were unacquainted with them 
(Mark vii. 2-4 ; xv. 6). He is much more brief than 



THE FOUR GOSPELS. 177 

the other evangelists, and has but twenty -four verses 
the substance of which is not found in Matthew and 
Luke. Unlike Matthew he is very particular in narra- 
tive, and very much condenses the conversations and 
discourses of Jesus. 

There is no proof that he had ever seen the Gosp< ' 
of Matthew before writing his own ; much less th* 
his own is an abridgment of Matthew's, as some have 
supposed. The contrary is shown from the fact, that 
he is in not a few instances much more particular in 
his narrative than Matthew. (Compare Mark v. 1 with 
Matt. viii. 28 ; Mark ix. 14 with Matt. xvii. 12-14 ; and 
Mark xiv. 66, 67 with Matt. xxvi. 69). 

It is the uncontradicted testimony of antiquity, which 
there is no reason to doubt, that Mark spent the latter 
part of his life at Alexandria in Egypt, as pastor of 
the churches there ; and it is evident from 1 Peter v. 
13, that he had been with the apostle Peter in Baby- 
lon. Eusebius, E. H. ii. 15. 

The witnesses for Mark especially, are Papias, Justin 
Martyr, Irenaeus, Athenagoras, Clement of Alexandria, 
Tertullian, Origen, Eusebius, Epiphanius, Jerome. 

A specimen of their testimony we subjoin. 

TESTIMONIES TO MARK. 

Papias: "And John the Presbyter said this: Mark 
being the interpreter of Peter, whatsoever he recorded 
he wrote with great accuracy, but not however in the 
order in which it was done or spoken by our Lord, for 
he neither heard nor followed our Lord, but as before 
said, he was in company with Peter, who gave him 

such information as was necessary wherefore 

Mark has not erred in anything but was care- 



178 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

fully attentive to one thing, not to pass by anything" 
that he heard, or to state anything falsely in these ac- 
counts." Euseb. E. H. iii. 39. 

Irenaeus not only directly quotes the Gospel of 
Mark ; but the last verses of this Gospel, which have 
been rejected by many writers, he especially ascribes 
to the evangelist Mark. Adv. Haer. iii. 10, 6. u Mark 
says in the end of his Gospel (Mark xvi. 19), And in- 
deed the Lord Jesus, after he had spoken to them, was 
received up into heaven, and sat on the right hand of 
God." 

Again, u Mark, the disciple and interpreter of Peter, 
transmitted to us in writing what had been preached 
by him." Euseb. E. H. v. 8. 

Origen : " The second (Gospel) is according to 
Mark, who composed it as Peter explained it to him, 
whom he also acknowledges as his son in his general 
epistle." etc. (1 Pet. v. 13.) Euseb. E. H. vi. 25. 

Justin Martyr : u In what suffering and torture the 
wicked will be, hear the words spoken in like manner 
on this point, for they are these (Mark ix. 44, 46, 48), 
their worm shall not cease and their fire shall not be 
quenched. Apol. ii. p. 87. 

"And as also it is requisite to worship God only, he 
thus declared, saying (Mark xii. 30), the greatest 
commandment of the law is, thou shalt worship the 
Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve, with all 
thy heart and with all thy might, the Lord who cre- 
ated thee." Apol. ii. p. 63. 

It is to be remembered, both here and elsewhere, 
that Justin does not quote book, chapter and verse, 
but only the sense of each passage, and for the con- 
venience of the reader, I insert in parenthesis the 



THE FOUR GOSPELS. 179 

reference to the text quoted. This is to be noticed in 
every instance of quotations from the fathers, for they 
indeed, as has already been shown, had no chapters 
and verses to refer to. 

Athenagoras : Mark x. 11, u For whosoever shall put 
away his wife, and marrieth another, committeth adul- 
tery." 

Tertullian : " The Gospel which Mark published, is 
affirmed as Peter's, whose interpreter Mark was." 
Adv. Marcion iv. 5. 

Epiphanius : "And immediately after Matthew, 
Mark, the companion of St. Peter at Rome, is directed 
to put forth a Gospel; which having written, he is 
sent by St. Peter into the country of the Egyptians." 
Haeres. 51. 

Jerome : "Mark, the disciple and interpreter of Pe- 
ter, being asked by the brethren at Rome, wrote a Gos- 
pel in brief, according to what he had heard Peter rela- 
ting ; and when Peter had heard it, he approved of 
it, and gave it forth to be read in the churches by his 
authority, as Clement also writes in the sixth book of 
the Hypotuposeis." Catal. Script, c. 8. 

Hippolytus : "Jesus says to all at the same time, 
concerning the gifts which shall be given by him 
through the Holy Spirit (Mark xvi. 27), And these 
signs shall follow them that believe, in my name they 
shall cast out devils, they shall speak with new tongues, 
they shall take up serpents, and if they drink any 
deadly thing it shall not hurt them, and they shall lay 
hands on the sick, and they shall recover." Concern- 
ing Spiritual Gifts, Opp. p. 545. 

As observed before, and the reader must remember, 



180 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

the author quoted, Hippolytus, does not give the name 
of the book, nor the chapter and verse. 

Clement of Alexandria: " So greatly did the splem 
dor of piety enlighten the minds of Peter's hearers, 
(at Rome) that it was not sufficient to hear but once, 
nor to receive the unwritten doctrine of the Gospel of 
God ; but they persevered with various entreaties to 
solicit Mark, as the companion of Peter, and whose 
Gospel we have, that he should leave them a monu- 
ment of the doctrine thus orally communicated, in 
writing. Nor did they cease their solicitations until 
they had prevailed with the man, and thus became the 
means of that writing which is called the Gospel 
according to Mark. They say also that the apostle 
Peter having ascertained what was done by the reve- 
lation of the Spirit, was delighted with the zealous 
ardor expressed by these men, and that the history 
obtained his authority for the purpose of being read 
in the churches." Euseb. E. H. ii. 15. 

u When Peter had proclaimed the word publicly at 
Rome, and declared the Gospel under the influence 
of the Spirit ; as there was a great number present, 
they requested Mark, who had followed him from afar, 
and remembered well what he had said, to reduce the 
things to writing, and that after composing his Gospel, 
he gave it to them who had requested it of him." 
Euseb. E. H. vi. 14. 

GOSPEL OF LUKE. 

Luke was a gentile by birth, and a physician (Col. 
iv. 11, 14), and according to the prevailing testimony 
of the ancients, a citizen of Antioch, where the follow- 



THE FOUR GOSPELS. 181 

ers of Christ were first called Christians. He was 
familiar with Greek literature, as is evident from the 
style and structure of his two works, the Gospel and 
book of Acts, and his method of addressing them to 
Theophilus. The introductory verses of his Gospel 
are pure and even elegant Greek, and the same may 
be said of his introduction to the Acts ; and indeed 
wherever he writes independently in his own person, 
and does not quote from or relate the discourses of 
others. 

He became a zealous Christian and made himself 
familiarly acquainted by personal investigation (Luke 
i. 1-4) with all the circumstances attending the origin of 
Christianity, diligently studied the Hebrew Scriptures, 
and was the constant companion of the apostle Paul. 

Of Theophilus, the friend to whom he ascribes his 
two works, nothing is known with certainty. He was 
probably a Greek who lived out of Palestine, and per- 
haps at Antioch, the native city of Luke. 

The Gospel of Luke was written at about the same 
time with that of Mark ; and as the latter appears to 
have been designed particularly for the Romans, so 
the former seems especially adapted to the Greeks. 
Luke represents Christ as the Saviour of the world, 
without distinction of nations, and traces his genealogy 
through his mother Mary to Adam, the progenitor of 
the whole human family ; in this particular affording 
a contrast to the obviously Jewish complexion of the 
first chapter of Matthew. He is circumstantial in nar- 
rative, gives the dialogues of Christ with particularity, 
and is careful to insert geographical notices of the 
places in Palestine which he mentions (Luke i. 26 ; iv. 
31; viii. 26; Acts i. 12). 



182 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Of all the evangelists he is the only one who gives a 
detailed account of the circumstances which preceded 
and attended the births of John Baptist and Jesus ; 
and in this part of his Gospel the style is more strongly 
Hebraistic than in any other part of the New Testa- 
ment, if we except the Apocalypse. Luke probably 
copied this narrative and the genealogy just as he found 
them in the family of Elizabeth and Mary. 

Luke was the companion of Paul in many of his 
missionary journeys, as we see by the book of Acts ; 
and it is said that after Paul's martyrdom he preached 
in Italy, Dalmatia, Macedonia, Bithynia, and finally 
suffered martyrdom at a very advanced age. 

The witnesses to Luke's Gospel are Justin Martyr, 
the Letter of the church of Vienne and Lyons, Ire- 
naeus, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of 
Alexandria, Tertullian, Julius Africanus, Jerome. 

A specimen of the testimony we subjoin. 

TESTIMONIES TO LUKE. 

Church of Vienne and Lyons. Of one of their breth- 
ren they say; "That though young, he equalled the 
character of old Zacharias (Luke i. 6) ; for he walked 
in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord 
blameless." Lardner ii. 162. Euseb. E. H. v. 1. 

Tatian (Luke vi. 25): u You may laugh, but you 
will weep." Oration against the Gentiles, Lardner 
ii. 150. 

Tatian composed a harmony of the four Gospels, of 
course including Luke. Euseb. E. H. iv. 29. 

Athenagoras (Luke xvi. 18) : For whosoever, says 
he, shall put away his wife, and shall marry another, 
committeth adultery." Legat. Lardner ii. 196. 



THE FOUR GOSPELS. 183 

TTieophilus (Luke xviii. 27) : " For the things which 
with men are impossible are possible with God." Ad. 
Autol. Lardner ii. 205. 

Irenaeus : "Luke, the companion of Paul, commit- 
ted to writing the Gospel preached by him." Euseb. 
E. H. v. 8. 

"Luke, also, the follower and disciple of the apos- 
tles, referring to Zachariah and Elizabeth, of whom 
according to the promise of God, John was born, says 
they were both righteous before God," etc. (Luke i. 
6.) Adv. Haer. iii. 10. 

Clement of Alexandria: "But Luke also in the 
commencement of his narrative, premises the cause 
which led him to write, showing that many others, 
having rashly undertaken to compose a narration 
of matters that he had already completely ascer- 
tained, in order to free us from the uncertain supposi- 
tions of others, in his own Gospel, he delivered the 
certain account of those things, that he himself had 
fully received from his intimacy and stay with Paul, 
and also, his intercourse with the other apostles." 
Euseb. E. H. iii. 2, 4. 

Origen : " The third (Gospel) is according to Luke, 
the Gospel commended by Paul, which was written 
for the converts from the Gentiles. Euseb. E. H. 
vi. 25. 

"But Lucius some suppose to be Luke who wrote the 
Gospel." Comment, ad Bom. xvi. 2 

Justin Martyr: "As Christ indicated saying, To 
whom God hath given the more, he will also require 
the more of him." (Luke xii. 48.) Apol. i. 28. 

" The power of God coming down upon the virgin 
overshadowed her. And at that time an angel being 



184 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

sent to the virgin herself brought joyful tidings to 
her." (Luke i. 35.) Apol. i. 54. 

" As also you can learn from the census that 
took place under Cyrenius, your first procurator in Ju- 
dea." (Luke ii. 2.) Apol. i. 55. 

" Therefore moved by fear, he did not put her away, 
but when the first census was taken in Judea under 
Cyrenius, he went from Nazareth where he dwelt to 
Bethlehem where he originated, that he might be en- 
rolled" (taxed). Luke ii. 1-5.) Apol. i. 303. 

"For that is what our Lord said, they shall neither 
marry nor be given in marriage, but shall be equal to 
the angels, being children of God, and of the resurrec- 
tion." (Luke xx. 35, 36.) Apol. i. 308. 

" In the memoirs which I say were composed by the 
apostles and those who followed them, we find that his 
sweat was as great drops of blood, while he prayed 
saying, if it be possible let this cup pass from me." 
(Luke xxii. 41.) Apol. i. 331. 

" Yielding up his spirit upon the cross he said, Father 
into thy hands I commit my spirit, as I have learned 
this also from those memoirs." (Luke xxiii. 46.) 
Apol. i. 333. 

Tertullian : "For from those commentaries which 
we have, Marcion seems to have selected Luke, whom 
he mutilated. Moreover Luke was not an apostle but 
an apostolic man, not a master but a disciple, as it were 
less than a master, and so much the later certainly as 
he was the companion of the later apostle Paul doubt- 
less." Adv. Marcion iv. 2. 

Julius Africanus. This writer compares the gene- 
alogy of Luke with that of Matthew. 

Eusebius : " But Luke, who was born at Antioch and 



THE FOUR GOSPELS. 185 

by profession a physician, being for the most part con- 
nected with Paul, and familiarly acquainted with the 
rest of the apostles, has left us in two inspired books, 
the institutes of that spiritual healing art which he 
obtained from them. One of these is his Gospel, in 
which he testifies that he has recorded as those who 
were from the beginning eye witnesses and ministers 
of the word, delivered to him, whom also he says he 
has in all things followed." Ecc. Hist. iii. 4. 

GOSPEL OF JOHN. 

John, the son of Zebedee and Salome, and the 
brother of James, was born in Bethsaida of Galilee, 
the native city of Andrew and Peter (John i. 40 ; Matt, 
iv. 18, 21). From the circumstances, that the father 
of John owned vessels on the sea of Galilee, and 
had hired servants in his employ ; and that his mother 
was one of those who provided for the support of 
Jesus and purchased costly spices for his embalming ; 
and that he had a house in Jerusalem, and was person- 
ally known to the high priest ; it is inferred that his 
family were in possession of property, and of respect- 
able rank. (Compare Mark i. 20; Matt, xxvii. 56; 
Luke xxiii. 56; John xix. 27; xviii. 15.) These cir- 
cumstances of superiority might possibly have embol- 
dened the mother of James and John to make for 
them the obnoxious request for precedence over the 
other disciples (Matt. xx. 20-24; Mark. x. 35). His 
mother was a devoted follower of Christ, but nothing 
is said respecting the religious character of his father. 

He was originally a disciple of John Baptist, and 
was among the first to follow Christ (John i. 35). 
Having afterwards returned to his business, he was one 



186 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

of the first whom Jesus called to the apostleship (Matt, 
iv. 18, 21). Andrew and Peter, James and John were 
the first chosen of the apostles ; three of them, Peter, 
James and John, were selected by Jesus to witness the 
glories of his transfiguration (Matt. xvii. 1 ; Mark v. 37), 
and the agonies of his humiliation in the garden ; two, 
Peter and John, remained with him when all the others 
forsook him and fled (John xviii. 15) ; and one only 
stood by him to the last and witnessed his death (John 
xix. 26), and this one was John; and to him the ex- 
piring Jesus affectionately committed the care of his 
mother, requesting him to discharge towards her the 
duties of a son. 

" Now there stood by the cross of Jesus his mother 
and his mother's sister, Mary the wife of Cleopas, and 
Mary Magdalene. When Jesus, therefore, saw his 
mother, and the disciple standing by, whom he loved, 
he said unto his mother, Woman, behold thy son! 
Then saith he to the disciple, Behold thy mother! 
And from that hour that disciple took her unto his 
own house." 

Peter and John were first at the tomb of Christ, 
after the news of his resurrection (John xx. 2-8). 

According to ancient testimony, John was the 
youngest of the apostles, and some four or five years 
younger than Jesus, and the Gospel designates him as 
the disciple whom Jesus loved. 

He remained at Jerusalem, as Eusebius informs us, 
till after the death of Jesus' mother and the imprison- 
ment of Paul ; when he went to Ephesus, about A. D. 
65, to take charge of the important church which Paul 
had established there (Acts xix. 1-20). Soon after he 



THE FOUR GOSPELS. 187 

was banished to Patmos by Nero* (Rev. i. 9), where 
he wrote the Apocalypse. After a time he was re- 
stored to Ephesus, where he established a theological 
school, for the purpose of supplying the numerous 
churches with competent pastors, as they could no 
longer expect the continuance of miraculous qualifica- 
tions. Hence he received the appellation of the theo- 
logian or divine. While engaged in this employment, 
he wrote his Gospel and Epistles ; and in the reign of 
Trajan, he died a natural death at a very advanced 
age. (Eusebius, Eccl. Hist. iii. 18, 23, 31, 39.) 

From several instances recorded of him in the Gos- 
pels, he seems to have been originally of an impetuous 
and fiery temper, which by the influence of the Chris- 
tian religion became entirely subdued, and produced 
that warmth of affection, that soul stirring energy of 
love, the softness, mildness, and richness of feeling, 
which we so much admire in this beloved apostle. 
(Luke ix. 49, 54, 55 ; Mark iii. 17; ix. 38, 39.) 

His Gospel probably was especially written for the 
use of his theological students, and it is equally distin- 
guished for the childlike simplicity of its language and 
the depth and pathos of its sentiment. It is supple- 
mentary to the others, and consists principally of the 

* Nero was of the Domitian family, and his full family designa- 
tion was Nero Claudius Domitius, or in the adjective form, Dom- 
itianus. This led to the misapprehension among some of the 
ancients that John suffered punishment under Domitian and not un- 
der Nero, but this was by no means the case with all. The subject is 
very thoroughly and satisfactorily discussed by Guericke in his ffin- 
leitung in das Neue Testament, p. 59-65, and 522-530, and also by 
Prof. Stuart in his Commentary on the Apocalypse, vol. i. p. 263— 
282. The discussion is too wide and involved to be entered into here. 



188 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

discourses of Jesus, which are characterized by so 
great freshness and naturalness, and so strong an ex- 
citement of the most inward emotions, that we are 
inclined to believe that they must be given nearly 
word for word as they were uttered. The ancients, 
on account of these peculiarities, called this the spir- 
itual gospel ; and by a distinguished modern, Ernesti, 
it has been styled the heart of Jesus. Though the 
most simple in its language, it is the most difficult of 
all to be fully comprehended. There is great pecu- 
liarity in the use of words, such as light, life, word, &c, 
and a depth of meaning which has not often been 
fully explored. It is always a favorite book among 
those who have full sympathy with the spirituality of 
the Christian religion, but very mystical and obscure 
to such as know Christianity only in its outward forms 
and precepts. 

Chrysostom, in -speaking of this Gospel, expresses 
himself in terms like the following : "If the spectators 
of orators, musicians, and athletes, sit with so great 
willingness to see and hear, how great readiness and zeal 
should we manifest when, not a musician, not a sophist, 
enters the scene, but a man speaking from the heavens 
and uttering a voice more majestic than thunder ! For 
he seizes and holds the world, and fills it with his 
tones, not by a loud cry, but by moving his tongue 
with divine grace: and what is wonderful, this voice, 
though so great, is neither harsh nor unpleasant, but 
sweeter, more persuasive, more enchanting than all the 
harmony of music ; and besides all this, most holy and 
most exciting, full of unspeakable glories, and convey- 
ing so great blessings, that those who with readiness 



THE FOUR GOSPELS. 189 

ana diligence receive and retain them, are no longer 
like mortal men, nor do they abide upon earth, but 
rise above all transitory things, and being transferred 
to the angelic inheritance, so inhabit earth as if it were 
heaven. 11 (Preface to Homilies on John). 

Augustin speaks with equal enthusiasm. " In the 
four Gospels, or rather in the four books of the one 
Gospel, John has not unaptly been compared to the 
eagle on account of his etherial intelligence ; for he 
carries his preaching to a much higher and more sub- 
lime elevation than the other three, and in his eleva- 
vation wills our hearts also to be raised. The other 
three evangelists walked with the Lord as with a man 
on earth, and said but little concerning his divinity ; 
but John, as if it were irksome to him to remain on 
earth, thunders, as it were, in the very beginning of 
his Gospel, rises not only above the earth and above 
the whole circuit of the atmosphere and heavens, but 
even above all the hosts of angels, and the whole order 
of the invisible powers, and makes his way directly to 
him by whom all things are done, saying : ' In the be- 
ginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, 
and the Word was God.' The rest of the Gospel cor- 
responds to this great sublimity of its commencement. 
He freely gave what he had freely received. For it is 
not without reason, that it is said of him in this very 
Gospel, that he leaned on the breast of the Lord at 
the last supper. From that breast he imbibed in secret, 
and what he had imbibed in secret he gave out openly." 
(Tract, in Johan. 36.) 

Origen also says, "It is not too much to affirm, that 
as the Gospels are the chief of all writings, so the Gos- 



190 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

pel of John is the chief of the Gospels ; but no one 
can understand it except by reclining on the bosom 
of Jesus ; and so far, indeed, he must become another 
John, as John by sympathy becomes another Jesus." 
(Com. in Johan.) 

But the most characteristic description of the pecu- 
liar style of John is by Matthias Claudius, an eccentric 
German writer. He says, " It delights me most of all 
to read in St. John. There is in him something so 
entirely wonderful, twilight and night, and through it 
the swiftly darting lightning — a soft evening cloud, and 
behind the cloud the broad full moon bodily ; some- 
thing so deeply, sadly pensive, so high, so full of an- 
ticipation, that one can not have enough of it. In 
reading John, it is with me always as though I saw 
him before me, lying on the bosom of his Master, at 
the last supper; as though his angel were holding the 
light for me, and in certain passages would fall upon 
my neck, and whisper something in my ear. 

U I am far from understanding everything which I 
read, but it often seems to me as if what John meant, 
were floating before me in the distance; and even 
where I look into a passage altogether dark, I have a 
foretaste of some great, glorious meaning, which I 
shall one day understand, and for this reason I grasp 
so eagerly after every new interpretation of the Gos- 
pel of John. Indeed the most of them only crisp* 

* See Goethe's Faust. Scene first, " Your speeches I say, which 
are so highly polished, in which ye crisp the shreds of humanity, are 
unrefreshing as the mist-wind which whistles through the withered 
leaves in autumn." 



THE FOUR GOSPELS. 191 

the evening cloud, and the moon behind has quiet 
rest." (Claudius's Works, vol. i. p. 9.) 

The witnesses to John's Gospel are Barnabas, Pastor 
Hernias, Clement of Rome, Papias, Ignatius, Justin 
Martyr, the Letter to Diognetus, the Letter of the 
Churches of Yienne and Lyons, Irenaeus, Polycrates, 
Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexan- 
dria, Tertullian, Caius of Rome, Origen, Dionysius of 
Alexandria, Eusebius, Dorotheus of Tyre, Victorinus 
of Pettau, Epiphanius, Jerome. 

Theodore of Mopsuestia, who lived in the latter 
part of the fourth century, preserves the following 
curious tradition respecting John's Gospel, which is 
well worthy of regard. Towards the close of the 
apostle's long life, the first three Gospels were laid 
before him by his neighboring ministers, to which he 
gave his sanction, but said that important particulars 
had been omitted, and at their earnest request, he sup- 
plied those omissions in the Gospel which he then 
wrote. (Wordsworth on Canon, p. 136-7.) 

We now give a specimen of the testimony above 
referred to. 

Ignatius : " He also is the gate of the Father, by 
whom enter in Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and the 
prophets and the apostles and the church. (John x. 
9.) Ad Philadelph. c. 9. 

" Wherefore as the Lord without the Father doeth 
nothing." (John viii. 28.) Ad Magn. ,c. 7. 

"But living water, also speaking in me says within 
me, come to the Father ; I rejoice not in corruptible 
food, nor in the pleasures of this life ; I desire the 
bread of God, the heavenly bread, the bread of life, 



192 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

which is the flesh of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, 
afterward born of the seed of David, and I desire the 
drink which is the blood, which is love incorruptible 
and life eternal." (John vi. 32, 33, 45 ; xlv. 51-58.) 
Ad Rom. c. 7. 

Justin Martyr : "For Christ himself says, except ye 
be born again ye can not enter into the kingdom of 
heaven." ( John iii. 4. 5.) Apol. i. 89. 

"And Jesus Christ was begotten, the only genuine 
Son of God, being His Word." (John i. 1, 19.) 
Apol. ii. 68. 

"But the Word of God is His Son." Apol. ii. 95. 

" By the Word of God Jesus Christ our Saviour 
was made flesh." (John i. 14.) Apol. ii. 98. 

" But the men supposed him (John Baptist) to be 
Christ, among whom he cried, I am not the Christ, but 
the voice of one crying, etc." (Johni. 20, 23.) DiaL 
p. 316. 

"And he gave himself to be touched by them, and 
he showed the prints of the nails in his hands. (John 
xx. 27.) De Resurrect. 

Epistle to Diognetus : " This (the Word) is the same 
who was from the beginning." (John i. 1.) 

Epistle of the Churches at Yienne and Lyons: "And 
that was fulfilled which was predicted by our Lord in 
these words, The time will come when whosoever kill- 
eth you will think he doeth God service." (John xvi 
2.) Euseb. E: H. v. 1. 

Barnabas, xii. : " And again Moses makes a type of 
Jesus, to show that he was to die, and then that he, 
whom they thought to be dead, was to give life to 
others ; in the type of those that fell in Israel. For 



THE FOUR GOSPELS. 193 

God caused all sorts of serpents to bite thern, and they 
died ; forasmuch as by a serpent, transgression began 
in Eve ; that so he might convince them that for their 
transgressions they shall be delivered into the pain of 
death. Moses then himself, who had commanded 
them, saying, Ye shall not make to yourselves any 
graven or molten image, to be your god, yet now did 
so himself, that he might represent to them the figure 
of the Lord Jesus. For he made a brazen serpent, 
and set it up on high, and called the people together 
by a proclamation ; where being come, they entreated 
Moses that he would make an atonement for them, and 
pray that they might be healed." (John iii. 14.) 

Pastor Hermas : " But the door is the Son of God, 
who is the only access to God. No one therefore will 
enter in to God otherwise than by his Son." (John x. 
7-9.) Simil. ix. 12. 

Clement of Rome : " Our Lord Jesus Christ, 

being beaten by the servants of the high priest, an- 
swered, If I have spoken evil, bear witness of the evil, 
but if well, why smitest thou me." Kirchhofer, p. 144 

Irenaeus: "Afterwards John, the disciple of our 
Lord, the same that lay upon his bosom, also published 
the Gospel, while he was yet at Ephesus in Asia," 
Euseb. E. H. v. 8. 

" All the elders testify, who were conversant with 
John the disciple of our Lord in Asia, that John deliv- 
ered these things." Adv. Haer. ii. 22. 

tc John, the disciple of our Lord, announcing this 

faith thus began, in the doctrine 

which is according to the Gospel, In the beginning 
was the Word." (John i. 1.) Adv. Haer. iii. 11. 
13 



194 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Poly crates: "Moreover John, who rested on the 
bosom of our Lord, who was a friend that bore the 
sacerdotal plate, and a teacher and witness, lies buried 
at Ephesus." (John xiii. 23.) Euseb. E. H. iii. 31. 

Tatian : "All things were made by him, and with- 
out him was not anything made." (John i. 3.) Orat. 
cont. Graec. 158. 

" And this also is said, The darkness did not com- 
prehend the light. The word indeed is the light of 
God." (John i. 5.) Orat. 132. 

" God is a spirit." (John iv. 24.) Orat. p. 144. 

Aihenagoras : " But the Son of God is the Word 
of the Father, in idea and in work ; for by him and 
through him were all things made, the Father and the 
Son being one ; the Son being in the Father and the 
Father in the Son by the union and power of the 
Spirit, for the Son of God is both the mind and the 
Word of the Father." (John i. 3 ; x. 30, 38.) Legat. 10. 

" For God was from the beginning, being eternal 
mind ; and He himself had the word in himself being 
eternally endowed with the Word. (John i. 1, 2.) 
Legat. 10. 

Theojphilus : "As the Holy Scriptures and all who 
have the Spirit teach us, among whom John says, In 
the beginning was the Word and the Word was with 
God ; signifying that God alone was in the beginning 
and that the Word was in Him. And then he says, 
The Word was God, and all things were made by 
Him, and" without Him there was not anything made." 
(John i. 1-3.) Ad. Autol. ii. 

Clement of Alexandria : " John, last of all, perceiv- 
ing that what had reference to the body in the Gospel 



THE FOUR GOSPELS. 195 

of our Saviour was sufficiently detailed, and being en- 
couraged by his particular friends and urged by the 
Spirit, he wrote a spiritual Gospel." Euseb. E. H. vi. 
14, compare iii. 24. 

Tertullian: "Of the apostles, John and Matthew 
publish the faith to us." Ad. Marc. iv. 2. 

Origen : " What shall we say of him who reclined 
on the breast of Jesus, I mean John ? who has left one 
Gospel, in which he confesses that he could write so 
many that the whole world could not contain them." 
Euseb. E. H. vi. 25. 

Dionysius of Alexandria : "The Gospel and Epistle 
(of John) mutually agree ; for the one says, In the 
beginning was the Word, and the other, That which 
was from the beginning ; the one says, The Word was 
made flesh and dwelt among us, and we saw his glory, 
the glory % as of the only begotten of the Father ; the 
other says the same things a little altered, That which 
we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, and 
which our hands have handled of the Word of life, 
and the life was manifested." Euseb. E. H. vii. 25. 

Victorinus of Pettau: "For he (John) afterwards 
wrote the Gospel." Lardner iv. 211. 

Dorotheus of Tyre: "John, the brother of James, 
who was made the evangelist of the Lord, whom also 
the Lord loved, proclaimed in Asia the Gospel of the 
Lord Jesus Christ." De Yit. et mort. proph. 

Eusebias : "The Gospel of John comprehends the 
first events of Christ, but the others the history that 
took place at the latter part of the time. It is proba- 
ble therefore that for these reasons John has passed 
by in silence the genealogy of our Lord, because it 



196 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

was written by Matthew and Luke ; but that he com- 
menced with the doctrine of the divinity, as a part 
reserved for him by the divine Spirit, as if for a supe- 
rior. Let this suffice to be said respecting the Gospel 
of John." Eccl. Hist. iii. 24. 

EpijpJianius : " Wherefore also the blessed John com- 
ing, and seeing men busying themselves with the lower 
coming of Christ, and the Ebionites deducing the 
bodily genealogy of Christ from Abraham .... 

. . . said not that the Word 

of God, whom the Father begat from eternity was 
from Mary alone, nor from Joseph the husband of the 
virgin, but, In the beginning was the Word, and the 
Word was with God, and the Word was God." Haer. 
lxix. 23. 

Jerome : " The apostle John, whom Jesus especially 
loved, the son of Zebedee and the brother of the apos- 
tle James, whom Herod beheaded after the passion of 
our Lord, wrote the Gospel last of all, being called 
thereto by the bishops of Asia, against Cerinthus and 
other heretics, and especially the dogmas of the 
Ebionites, who assert that Christ did not exist before 
Mary." Catal. Scrip. Eccl. c. 9. 

u He wrote this Gospel in Asia, after he had written 
the Apocalypse in the island of Patmos — the last of 
the Gospels." Praef. in Cod. Antiq. 

RELATION OF THE GOSPELS TO EACH OTHER. 

In the four evangelists, we have a fourfold picture 
of the Saviour ; the same perfect character as it im- 
pressed its image on four minds of different structure 
and habits ; and the picture in each instance receives 



THE FOUR GOSPELS. 197 

a different shade of coloring in consequence of the 
particular purpose and genius of each writer. 

Matthew develop es the character of Christ in the 
way best adapted to take hold of the devout Jews, 
looking for the hope of their fathers as promised in 
the Old Testament. Mark writes for the grave, severe, 
matter of fact Roman; Luke, for the versatile and 
learned Greek, whose eager curiosity could never sleep 
— and John, for the deeply reflecting, philosophical 
spirit, which feels keenly the want of that which earth 
cannot afford, and whose intense desires remain unsat- 
isfied amid all the physical and intellectual luxuries 
that satiate the rest of mankind. Matthew exhibited 
the human and subordinate ; John, the spiritual and 
divine of the Redeemer ; Mark, his official character ; 
and Luke, his personal history. 

In the four we have Jesus represented to us as the 
Messiah, the Teacher, the Pattern, and the God. (Com- 
pare Olshausen's Introduction to his Commentary on 
the New Testament.) 

Throughout the Bible, God recognizes the principle 
of approaching different minds by different means, and 
has so arranged his word that no constitutional pecul- 
iarity remains untouched. Whatever may be your pe- 
culiar temperament or habits of mind, in the Bible you 
will find a Redeemer adapted to your wants, and a Gos- 
pel suited to your condition. Try the character and 
claims of Jesus by the various and pressing spiritual 
necessities of men, and see how exactly he answers to 
them all ; with what certainty he leads every variety 
of character submitted to his direction towards its own 
proper perfection ; by what appropriate methods he 



198 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

corrects every evil disposition and soothes every sor- 
row ; how equally he reveals himself to the most en- 
lightened and the least instructed of those who make 
him their Saviour ; how uniformly all his precepts are 
fitted to the nature and condition of men and tend to 
promote their highest happiness ; how strong a hold 
he has on the warmest and most devoted affections of 
all who choose him for their friend ; with what unde- 
viating confidence they trust him, and with what un- 
shaken faith they preserve the consciousness of his 
presence and love ; and how this confidence and faith, 
when regulated by his instructions, never fails to im- 
part unalloyed improvement to the intellect and the 
affections ; how hope by his influence continues steady 
through every kind of worldly trial, and brightens to 
rapturous vision when man is called to nature's last 
struggle — consider, also, that -all this influence has been 
steadily increasing from its first commencement, and 
that the number, the zeal, the intelligence, and the 
power of those who act under it, was never so great 
as at the present time, and never so rapidly increasing 
— contemplate all this, as it actually occurs in this 
cold, sensual world ; and awed by a miracle really more 
stupendous than the darkness and the earthquake, the 
rending rocks and the opening graves of the cruci- 
fixion-day, will you not exclaim with the Roman sol- 
dier, Truly this man ivas the Son of God! (Mark 
xv. 39.) 

I ask the reader's careful attention to the following 
extracts from Augustin, as admirably translated by 
Dr. Wordsworth, in the introduction to his Commen. 
tary on the New Testament. I insert them here be- 



THE FOUR GOSPELS. 199 

cause the fathers had ways of looking at the books of 
the Bible, which in our day have nearly become obso- 
lete, and which ought in some measure at least to be 
revived. The incredulity of our own times in regard 
to the Bible is due, not so much to the want of evi- 
dence as to the want of that reverence and affection 
and admiration of the Scriptures, which so distinguished 
the Christians of the early ages. 

"We concur with those," says St Augustin, "who, 
in interpreting the Vision of the Four Living Crea- 
tures in the Apocalypse, which represent the Four 
Gospels, assign the Lion, the King of all Beasts, to 
St. Matthew / and the Ox, the Sacrificial Victim, to St 
Luke. The Apocalypse itself says, L The Lion of the 
Tribe of Judah prevailed to open the book; 1 and 
thus it designates the Lion as symbolical of Christ our 
King. 

" St. Mark follows St. Matthew, and relates what 
Christ did in His Human Nature, without special refer- 
ence to His functions as King or Priest, and is there- 
fore fitly symbolized in the Apocalyptic vision as the 
Man. 

"These three Living Creatures — the Lion, the Ox, 
the Man — walk on the earth. The first three Evange- 
lists describe especially those things which Christ did 
in our flesh, and relate the precepts which He deliv- 
ered on the duties to be performed by us while we 
walk on earth and dwell in the flesh. But St. John 
soars to heaven as an Eagle, above the clouds of human 
infirmity, and reveals to us the mysteries of Christ's 
Glodhead, and of the Trinity in Unity, and the felici- 
ties of Life Eternal ; and gazes on the Light of Ini- 
mitable Truth with a keen and steadv ken. 



200 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

" The first three Evangelists inculcate the practical 
duties of Active Life ; St. John dwells on the ineffa- 
ble mysteries of the Contemplative : the former speak 
of Labour, the last speaks of Rest: the former lead 
the Way, the last shows our Home. In the former we 
are cleansed from sin, in the last we enjoy the beatific 
Vision promised to the pure in heart who will see God. 

"He, who is the last in order, declares more fully 
the Divine Nature of Christ, by which he is Equal to 
and One with the Father, and in which He made the 
World ; as if this Evangelist, who reclined on the bo- 
som of Christ at Supper, had imbibed in a larger 
stream the mystery of His Divinity from His lips. 

" This Evangelic Quaternion is the fourfold Car of 
the Lord, upon which He rides throughout the world, 
and subdues the Nations to His easy yoke. The Mys- 
tery of His Royalty and Priesthood, which was fore- 
told by Prophecy, is proclaimed in the Gospel. The 
same Lord Christ, Who sent the Prophets before His 
descent from heaven into this world, has now sent His 
Apostles after His Ascension. He is the Head of all 
His Disciples; and since His Disciples have written 
those things which He did and said, we are not to 
affirm with some, that Christ wrote nothing. They 
wrote, as His members, what they knew from the dic- 
tation of Him who is their Head. Whatsoever He 
willed that we should know of His own Words and 
Deeds, this he commanded them to write, as it were, 
by His own hand. Whoever, therefore, rightly com- 
prehends the fellowship of Unity, and the Ministry of 
His Members acting harmoniously in different func- 
tions under their Divine Head, will receive what he 



THE FOUR GOSPELS. 201 

reads in the Gospel from the narration of the Evange- 
lists, with no other feeling than if he saw the very 
hand of Christ Himself, which He has in His own 
body, performing the act of writing. 

In the first three Evangelists, the gifts of active 
virtue, — in the last, St. John, those of contemplative, 
shine forth. To one man is given by the Spirit the 
word of wisdom ; to another the ivord of knowledge by 
the same Spirit. One drinks wisdom from the bosom 
of Christ; another man is raised to the third heaven, 
and hears unutterable words. But as long as they are 
in the body, all are absent from the Lord. And all 
who believe with good hope, and are written in the 
Book of Life, have this promise reserved to them, — ■ 
I will love him, and ivill manifest Myself to him. In 
proportion as we make greater progress in knowledge 
and intelligence in this mortal pilgrimge of life, let us 
be more and more on our guard against two devilish 
sins, Pride and Envy. Let us remember, that as St. 
John elevates us more and more to the contemplation 
of the Truth, so much the more does he instruct us in 
the sweetness of Love. That precept is most health- 
ful and true, — The greater thou art, the more humble 
thyself, and thou shalt find favour before the Lord. The 
Evangelist who reveals to us Christ more sublimely 
than the rest, he also shows us the humility of Christ 
washing His Disciples' feet." 



Another remark of St. Augustin's has in it so much 
of good sense, and is so far in advance of the opin- 
ions of many even at the present day, that I am hap- 
py to make place for it here : 

"There are varieties, but not contrarieties, in the 
Gospels; and by means of these varieties we may 
learn some very useful and necessary truths. We are 
thus reminded that the main thing for us, is to ascer- 
tain the meaning to which the words are ministerial ; 
and we are not to imagine that the Sacred Writers 
deceive us because they do not give us the precise words 
of Him whose meaning they desire to express. Other- 
wise we shall be like mere miserable caterers at sylla- 
bles, (miseri aucupes vocum,) who imagine that the 
truth is to be tied to the points of letters ; whereas, 
not in words only, but also in all other symbols of the 
mind, it is the mind itself which is to be sought for." 
Wordsworth on the Gospels, p. xlvii. 



CHAPTER SEVENTH. 



THE APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 

COMPARISON OF THE CANONICAL GOSPELS WITH THE APOC- 
RYPHAL GOSPELS STILL EXTANT. 

The impugners of the New Testament Gospels ap- 
peal to the fact, that there are gospels acknowledged 
to be apocryphal, as a proof of their theory that our 
recognized Gospels are also myths or forgeries. Any 
one who candidly examines these spurious gospels, and 
compares them with the New Testament, will find in 
them, not a refutation of our sacred writers, but a 
most convincing testimony to their intelligence, hon- 
esty and supernatural inspiration. So totally diverse 
are they from the genuine Gospels in conception, in 
spirit, in execution, in their whole impression, in all 
respects so entirely unlike, so immeasurably inferior, 
that the New Testament only shines the brighter by 
the contrast. They have scarcely so much resemblance 
to the genuine Gospels as the monkey has to a man. 

The inspiration of the canonical books is proved 
quite as strongly by what they omit as by what they 
insert ; and this ray of evidence shines out very clearly 
on a comparison of the apocryphal gospels with the 
Gospels of the New Testament. 



204 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

An elaborate history and collection of these writings 
was first published by Fabricius near the beginning 
of the last century. The first volume of a new and 
critical edition was issued at Halle by Thilo in 1832. 
Prof. Norton has given an account of them in the third 
volume of his work on the Genuineness of the Gos- 
pels, but with an incredulity in regard to the testimo- 
ny of the ancients which amounts almost to credu- 
lousness ; yet it is very useful to be studied in connec- 
tion with other and more credulous authorities. Ull- 
mann gives a very good abstract of them in his treatise 
entitled Historisch oder Mythisch, and Guericke in his 
Introduction to the New Testament makes a brief and 
intelligible catalogue of them. Quite recently Dr. 
Hoffmann of Leipzig has compiled a life of Jesus ac- 
cording to the Apocrypha, accompanied with learned 
annotations. English translations of the principal apoc- 
ryphal writings of the New Testament have been col- 
lected and published both in England and the United 
States. If this has been done with any purpose of 
bringing discredit on our genuine New Testament, the 
design has most signally failed, for on every fair minded 
and intelligent reader, they must produce directly the 
opposite effect. 

Fabricius gave the titles of about fifty of such spu- 
rious writings, and the industry of subsequent investi- 
gations has added to the number ; but scarcely one- 
tenth part of these are now extant, and probably there 
were never more than ten or a dozen distinct works of 
the kind, the others being different recensions of the 
same narrative, or different titles of the same work, or 
mere repetitions of each other. The best editions of 



APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 205 

the apocryphal gospels are the two following, to wit, 
that by Thilo, published at Halle in 1832, who gives 
twelve ; and that by Tischendorf, published at Leipsic 
in 1854, who gives twenty-two. Not all of them, 
however, can with propriety be called gospels. Ma- 
homet derives his idea of Christ almost entirely from 
the apocryphal gospels, not at all rrom the genuine. 

THE APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 

Not more than seven of these now remain, which 
are worthy of notice, three of them in the Greek 
language, two in the Latin, and two in the Arabic. 
They are the following : 

1. The Protevangelium of James the hr other of the 
Lord, of which the full original title is this : Declara- 
tion and history how the most holy mother of God ivas 
born for our salvation. This seems to be the most 
ancient and valuable of these books ; it was first made 
known in Europe by W. Postel, about the middle of 
the sixteenth century, and was published by Fabricius 
in his Codex Apoc. Nov. Test. The principal part of 
it is occupied (cap. 1-20) with the history of the birth 
and childhood of Mary, and the circumstances attend- 
ing the birth of Christ. Then follows briefly and 
much in the manner of our Gospels (cap. 21, 22) the 
visit of the Magi and the flight into Egypt ; and it 
concludes (cap. 23, 24) with an extended description 
of the murder of Zachariah, the father of John the 
Baptist. The style of this gospel is far more simple 
and pure than that of any other of these apocryphal 
narratives, though in this respect, as in all others, it is 
immeasurably below the canonical books. Some things 



206 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

mentioned in it are alluded to by Justin Martyr and 
Clemens Alexandrinus, and the book is expressly 
quoted by Origen. It was in existence, at least a part 
of it, as early as the third century, though it was much 
later than that, before it was ascribed to the brother 
of our Lord, or took the title of Protevangelium. It 
was for a long time held in high estimation by the 
Greek church, and publicly read at their festivals, 
especially those which pertained to Mary. Yery prob- 
ably many of the early church traditions respecting 
Mary are preserved in it ; and in this respect it may 
gratify a curiosity for which the canonical Gospels 
make very little provision. 

2. The Greek Gospel of Thomas. This is one of the 
most extravagant of the apocryphal books, and pro- 
fesses to give a minute account of Jesus from the fifth 
to the twelfth year of his age. It is filled with mira- 
cles which are wholly ridiculous, and some of them 
decidedly immoral and malevolent. The beginning 
and close of the book are very fragmentary. Irenaeus 
(adv. Haer. i. 17) refers to some things contained in 
the book, and Origen (Horn, in Luc. i.) expressly men- 
tions it. There is not a shadow of probability that it 
was written by Thomas the apostle. It is evidently of 
heretical origin, and was highly esteemed and in great 
use among the Manichaeans. It is probably of con- 
siderably later date than the preceding one, and its 
Greek style is very impure. 

3. The Greek Gospel of Nicodernus. This, next to 
the Protevangelium, is the most important and respect- 
able, as well as the most widely circulated of the apoc- 
ryphal gospels. It is divided into two unequal parts, 



APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 207 

which seem originally to have been separate works. 
The first part (cap. 1-1 6) contains a minute description 
of the examination of Jesus before Pilate, and of his 
<Wucifixion and resurrection, and appears to be a re- 
modelling and amplification of certain epistles and acts 
of Pilate, which are very early mentioned, but have 
not come down to us in a reliable shape. (See Justin 
Martyr, Apol. i. 76, 84; Tertull. Apol. 21 ; Oros. Hist, 
vii. 4; Euseb H. E. ii. 2.) It is probably of Jewish- 
Christian origin, and written for the purpose of affect- 
ing unbelieving Jews by the example of Annas and 
Caiaphas, who, it alleges, were converted by the testi- 
mony of Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea. 

The second part (cap. 19-27) describes Christ's de- 
scent into Hades and the wonderful things he accom- 
plished there. This is apparently more modern than 
the first part. Some Latin manuscripts have an addi- 
tional chapter, in which Annas and Caiaphas make 
oath before Pilate that they are convinced, from all 
the testimony, that the Jesus, condemned and executed 
at their instigation, is truly the Son of God. There 
are also printed with it, by Thilo, letters of Pilate to 
the emperors Claudius and Tiberius. 

The book, in its present form, can not have been 
earlier than the fifth century, and was probably much 
later. It is not expressly mentioned until the thirteenth 
century. The prologue, which states that it was writ- 
ten in the Hebrew language by Nicodemus in the time 
of Christ, and translated into Greek by a Jewish 
Christian, named Ananias, during the reign of the 
emperor Theodosius, is evidently a mere fiction. The 
book was held in high esteem during the middle ages, 



208 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

and before the invention of the art of printing it had 
been translated into Latin, Gaelic, Anglo-Saxon, Ger- 
man and French. 

4. The Latin Gospel of the Nativity of Mary. This* 
probably belongs to the sixth century. The prologue, 
which states that it was written by Matthew, and trans- 
lated into Latin by Jerome, deserves no regard. It 
goes over the same ground as the Protevangelium ; but 
is more minute as to the birth of Mary, and more con- 
densed on the other points. 

5. The Latin History of the Nativity of Mary and 
of the Infancy of the Saviour. The first part (cap. 1- 
17) from the annunciation of Mary to the Bethlehem 
massacre, follows mainly the Protevangelium, though 
with considerable variations and amplifications ; while 
the latter part, the childhood of the Saviour, is more 
like the apocryphal books which we find in the Arabic 
language. 

6. The Arabic History of Joseph the Carpenter. In 
this book, Christ is introduced as discoursing with his 
disciples, and gives them a long and marvelous account 
of the life, death and burial of Joseph. Its Arabic 
style has an air of antiquity about it, though it is some- 
what bombastic. It seems to be the product of a Jew- 
ish Christian, and a translation from the Hebrew. It 
may possibly, in its present form, be as early as the 
third or fourth century. 

7. The Arabic Gospel of the Childhood of the Re- 
deemer. This book was in high esteem among the 
Nestorians, and may have been the product of some 
Nestorian Christian of the fifth or sixth century, and 
originally written in Syriac. Cap. 1-9 relates minutely 



APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 209 

the birth of Christ; 10-26 the flight into Egypt, and 
the wonderful miracles wrought by his presence, his 
clothes, the water in which he had been washed, etc. ; 
27-35 another course of miracles through the instiga- 
tion of Mary; 36-49 miracles wrought by the boy of 
his own accord, all of them childish, some of them 
obscene ; and cap. 50 relates a visit made to the tem- 
ple at Jerusalem. 

ABSTRACT OF THE APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 

Having thus given an account of these books, it 
remains that we present an outline of their contents, in 
order to afford opportunity for a comparison between 
them and the genuine. To avoid repetition, it will be 
most convenient to do this in the form which Uilmann 
has adopted in the work above referred to, namely, by 
grouping into one view what is said in the different 
books respecting the same person or subject. Each 
subject, however, has some one book particularly de- 
voted to it, so that an analysis of a subject is generally 
the analysis of a book. We begin with 

Joseph. According to the Arabic History of Joseph 
(No. 6), Christ, seated in the midst of his disciples 
on the mount of Olives, relates for substance the fol- 
lowing story: " Joseph, well acquainted with the arts 
and sciences, was a priest in the temple of the Lord ; 
but he pursued his carpenter's trade, and lived, even 
in Egypt, by the labor of his hands, that, according 
to the law, he might not, for his support, be charge- 
able to any one. He was highly distinguished, not 
only by his intellectual qualities, but also by the phys- 
ical ; he never suffered from weakness, his sight never 
14 



210 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

failed, he never lost a tooth nor had the toothache, he 
never lost his presence of mind, he always walked 
erect, he never had a pain in his limbs, and was always 
fresh and cheerful for labor. He lived to be a hun- 
dred and twelve years old, and it was not till near the 
close of his life that he felt any diminution of the live- 
liness and vigor of his mind or body, or lost in any 
degree his interest in his handicraft. An angel an- 
nounced to him his approaching death. He prayed 
God not to permit frightful-looking demons to come 
in his way, nor the gate-keepers of paradise to obstruct 
the entering in of his soul, nor the lions to rush upon 
him, nor the waves of the fiery sea, through which 
his soul must pass, to overwhelm him, before he had 
seen the glory of God. In the anguish of death Jo- 
seph cursed himself, his life, the day of his birth, the 
breasts he had sucked ; he heaped up all kinds of ac- 
cusations against himself, besides original sin, all kinds 
of actual sin, untruthfulness, hypocrisy, reproachful- 
ness, fraud, and many others. In this distress he calls 
upon Jesus, the Nazarene, as his Saviour and deliverer, 
his Lord and God, begs his pardon that he, through 
ignorance, had sinned against the mystery of his mirac- 
ulous birth by an unworthy suspicion, and then con- 
cludes, ' my Lord and God, be not angry, and con- 
demn me not on account of that hour ; I am thy serv- 
ant, and the son of thy handmaid, and thou art my 
Lord, my God and Saviour, the Son of God in truth.' 
This earnest prayer of Joseph not to be forsaken, being 
satisfactory, Jesus laid his hand upon the bosom of the 
dying man, and perceived that his soul was about to 
flee out of his mouth ; and from the south he sees 



APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 211 

death and hell approaching with their fiery troop ; and 
then, at his prayer, the archangels Michael and Gabriel 
appear, receive the soul of Joseph, enfold it in a 
lustrous garment, and protect it from the demons 
of darkness, which are found on the way. At the 
lamentations of the family, Nazareth and Galilee come 
together and take part in the mourning. Jesus utters 
a prayer which he had composed before he was born 
of Mary, and as soon as he says 'Amen,' a multitude of 
the heavenly host draws near ; he commands one of 
them to spread out a resplendent shroud, and therein 
enwrap the body of Joseph. Then he blessed the 
dead ; no smell of death should proceed from him, no 
worm should touch him, no limb should be decom- 
posed, no hair should fall from his head ; but he should 
remain entire and uninjured till the millennial feast. 
Afterwards the most distinguished men in the city 
come to array Joseph in his grave-clothes, but they 
can not remove from him the linen garment ; so closely 
and immovably does it adhere to his body, that they 
can not find a single fold by which they can seize hold 
of it." 

The apostles, to whom Jesus relates all this, only 
wonder that Joseph, the just one, whom Jesus calls 
his father, whose festival by the command of Jesus all 
the world must annually celebrate, was not, by the 
miraculous power of Jesus, made immortal, like Enoch 
and Elijah. To this Jesus replies, that by Adam all 
men without exception, who descended from him, are 
made mortal — that this is the fate which even Enoch 
and Elijah, who as yet retain their bodies, will experi- 
ence at the final consummation, when four will be slain 



212 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

by Anti- Christ, namely, Enoch and Elijah, Shilo and 
Tabitha. 

Towards the close of the book the celebration of 
Joseph's festival is most earnestly enjoined, as also the 
copying and circulating of this history of Joseph. 
Whoever, on the festival of Joseph, distributes alms, 
or offers gifts and prayers, shall be rewarded thirty, 
sixty, and a hundred fold ; whoever copies the history 
of his life, him will Christ commend to the special pro- 
tection of God for perfect absolution ; the poor, who 
have nothing to give, must at least give the name of 
Joseph to a new born son, and thus protect him from 
poverty and sudden death; and finally, as Christ in 
the canonical Gospels says, " Go and teach all nations," 
so here he says, u Proclaim to them the death of my 
father Joseph, celebrate his birth with a yearly festi- 
val ; and he who adds to this word or takes from it, is 
guilty of sin." 

In reading such a gospel as this, what a totally dif- 
ferent atmosphere we breathe from that of the canoni- 
cal Gospels ! We are transported at once to another 
age, to a different planet, to a totally diverse world 
of ideas. It is as different from the New Testament 
Gospels as Jack the Giant-killer is from Bunyan's Pil- 
grim's Progress. Yet it was written in or near the 
same country as the canonical Gospels, and probably 
not many generations later. 

Mary. Here we derive our information mainly 
from the book already quoted (No. 6), from the Pro- 
tevangelium (No. 1), from the Gospel of the Nativity 
of Mary (No. 4), and from the History of the Nativity 
of Mary (No. 5). In the History of Joseph (No. 6), 



APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 213 

Jesus makes the following statements respecting his 
mother, namely, that when she was three years old she 
was brought into the temple and remained there nine 
years, till she was twelve. At the close of this period, 
on consultation with the priests, that the change of 
constitution might not occur to her in the temple, and 
thereby God be incensed, it was resolved to give her 
to a just and pious man. Twelve venerable men from 
the tribe of Judah were called together, and the lot 
cast, by which she was given to Joseph, who took her 
away. With Joseph Mary found children of a former 
marriage, among them James, whom she brought up, 
and thence she was called the mother of James. In 
the fourteenth year of Mary's age, Christ, with the ap- 
probation of the Father, and the concurrence of the 
Holy Ghost, accomplished through her his incarnation, 
being born in a mysterious way which no created be- 
ing can understand. The birth, on account of which 
Joseph went with Mary to Bethlehem, occurred in that 
prophetic city in a cave near the grave of Rachel. 
Satan informed Herod of it, and this occasioned the 
persecution and flight into Egypt. Says Jesus : " Then 
Joseph arose and took my mother, and I rested in her 
bosom, and Salome accompanied us on our journey to 
Egypt." The family remained in Egypt a year, and 
Jesus relates all the circumstances, as if he had the 
most perfect recollection of them. 

The account of Mary in the Protevangelium is far 
more minute and circumstantial. In this narrative she 
is in a miraculous manner promised to her parents, 
Joachim and Anna, who had long been childless, and 
mourned and suffered much on that account. When 



w- 



214 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Mary was six months old, her mother put her on the 
floor to see whether she could stand, and she walked 
seven steps and then came back to the arms of her 
mother. In her third year she was brought into the 
temple attended by a company of pure virgins, and 
was received by the high priest with the eulogistic 
words : " Mary, the Lord hath exalted thy name among 
all generations, and in the last days God will reveal to 
thee the treasures of his redemption for the sons of 
Israel." Then the high priest placed her on the third 
step of the altar, and she sprang upon her feet and the 
whole house of Israel loved her. Mary was now 
brought up like a dove in the temple of the Lord, and 
received her food from the hand of an angel. By a 
revelation made to the high priest, at twelve years of 
age she must be betrothed to an Israelite for her pro- 
tection, and this her protector must be pointed out by 
a divine token. All the widowers of the people were 
to come together with their staves ; and he on whose 
staff the sign appeared, was to take her away. A 
dove flew out from the staff of Joseph, the last one, 
and rested upon his head ; and then, notwithstanding 
his reluctance, Mary was given to him. 

When Mary first went out to draw water, she heard 
a voice : " Hail, thou favored one, the Lord is with 
thee, blessed art thou among women." She looked 
about her to the right and left to see whence the voice 
proceeded ; and when she returned to the house, the 
angel of the Lord met her, and announced to her 
that she would be the mother of the Son of God. 
Joseph, when he sometime after returned from his 
work, was exceedingly shocked at the appearance of 




BETHLEHEM. 



APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 215 

Mary, and broke out into the most bitter complaints 
against her, both on her account and on his own. She 
resolutely asserted her purity. The affair came to the 
ears of the high priest, who called them before him 
and loaded them with reproaches. Mary affirmed that 
she was pure, and Joseph that he was innocent ; and 
they both passed the ordeal by drinking the water of 
proof, and with a result so clear that the high priest 
acquitted them. Soon after, on account of the enroll- 
ment, they took their journey to Bethlehem ; and on 
the way Joseph, perceiving that Mary is sometimes sad 
and sometimes laughing, inquires of her the cause. 
She answers : " I see two nations before mine eyes, the 
one sighing and weeping, the other exulting and laugh- 
ing." When the time of her delivery drew near, 
Joseph placed her in a cave and went out to seek a 
nurse. And here for a few sentences we will give the 
narrative literally as it is contained in the gospel. 

u As I was going (said Joseph) I looked up into 
the air and I saw the clouds astonished, and the fowls 
of the air stopping in the midst of their flight. And 
I looked down towards the earth, and I saw a table 
spread, and working people sitting around it, but their 
hands were upon the table and they did not move to 
eat. They who had meat in their mouths did not eat, 
they who lifted their hands to the table did not draw 
them back, and they who lifted them up to their 
mouths, did not put anything in, but all their faces 
were fixed upwards. And I beheld there sheep dis- 
persed, and yet the sheep stood still, and the shepherd 
lifted up his hand to smite them, and his hand contin- 
ued up. And I looked into the river, and saw the 



216 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

kids with their mouths close to the water, and touch- 
ing it, but they did not drink. Then I beheld a wo- 
man coming down from the mountains, and she said to 
me, ' Whither art thou going, man ? ' And I said 
to her, 'I go to inquire for a Hebrew midwife.' She 
replied to me, ' Where is the woman that is to be de< 
livered ? ' And I answered, ' In the cave, and she is 
betrothed to me.' Then said the midwife, 'Is she not 
thy wife ? ' Joseph answered, ' It is Mary, who was 
educated in the holy of holies, in the house of the 
Lord, and she fell to me by lot, and is not my wife, 
but hath conceived by the Holy Ghost' The midwife 
said, ' Is this true ? ' He answered, l Come and see.' 
And the midwife went along with him and stood in 
the cave. Then a bright cloud overshadowed the 
cave, and the midwife said, ' This day my soul is mag- 
nified, for mine eyes have seen surprising things, and 
salvation is brought forth to Israel.' But on a sudden 
the cloud became a great light in the cave, so that 
their eyes could not bear it. But the light gradually 
decreased, until the infant appeared and sucked the 
breast of his mother Mary. Then the midwife cried 
out and said, c How glorious a day is this, wherein 
mine eyes have seen this extraordinary sight ! ' And 
the midwife went out of the cave, and Salome met 
her. And the midwife said to her, ' Salome, Salome, 
I will tell you a most surprising thing which I saw. 
A virgin hath brought forth, which is a thing contrary 
to nature.' To which Salome replied, 'As the Lord 
my God liveth, unless I receive particular proof of 
this matter I will not believe that a virgin hath brought 
forth.' " 



APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 217 

The narrative goes on to inform us that Salome enter- 
ed the cave, and proceeded to examine that she might 
have demonstration of this wonderful fact, when her 
hand was seized with a blazing fire and excruciating 
pain ; and it was only by earnest prayer and the inter- 
position of a miracle, an angel directing her to take 
the child in her arms, that she was rescued. 

The Latin Gospel of the Birth of Mary (No. 4) is 
similar to the preceding, but has some things peculiar 
to itself. According to this, as many of the greatest 
and most holy persons were born of mothers before 
unfruitful, such was the case also with Mary. She was 
promised to her mother Anna as a special gift of God, 
by an angel, who also predicted her course of life. 
In her third year, having been taken by her parents to 
the temple, without a leader she walked up the steps 
like an adult ; and hereby the Lord indicated her future 
destination. During her residence in the temple, she 
was daily visited by angels and enjoyed the visions of 
God, whereby she was protected from all evil and filled 
with all good. In her fourteenth year, by the direc- 
tion of the priest, she with her companions were to be 
betrothed. They consented, but Mary resisted because 
she had vowed perpetual virginity. The priest in 
perplexity asked for a divine oracle, and was pointed 
to Isaiah xi. 1. In order now to espouse her to some 
one, he called together all the unmarried men of the 
house of David. They were to appear with their 
staves ; and he whose staff should blossom, or upon 
which the Spirit of the Lord should rest in the form 
of a dove, should be affianced to the virgin and take 
her under his protection. The decision was in favor 



218 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

of Joseph, for a dove came from heaven and seated 
itself upon his staff. During her residence in the 
house of Joseph, the angel of the annunciation ap- 
peared to her and she at once recognized him as a 
heavenly messenger, for she had already become famil- 
iar with such appearances. The angel promised to her 
a son, whom she would conceive and bring into the 
world without sin and with virginity intact. Mary 
wished to know how this were possible ; and the' 
angel informed her that it would be without the aid 
of man, solely by the Holy Ghost and the power of 
the Most High. 

The same general features pervade the other History 
of the Nativity of Mary (No. 5), though with enlarge- 
ments and additions, and still greater extravagances. 
According to this, Mary, when three years old, was 
like an adult ; her face glistened like the snow, so that 
one could scarcely look at it ; she busied herself with 
all the labors appropriate to woman, but especially 
with prayer, in which she continued from early dawn 
till the third hour of the day, and then again from the 
ninth hour onward, till there appeared to her the an- 
gel of the Lord, from whose hand she received her 
food, in order that she might daily grow in the love 
of God. Never was virgin more pious, more pure, 
more virtuous, more lovely, better instructed in the 
wisdom of the divine law ; she was firm, always equa- 
ble, immovable, constantly increasing in goodness. 
She took care for her companions, that none of them 
should fail in word, or laugh aloud, or do anything 
wrong. She lived only on angelic food ; the provisions 
which she received from the priests in the temple she 



APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 219 

distributed among the poor. When a sick person 
touched her, he returned well to his house. Fre- 
quently angels were seen waiting upon her and talk- 
ing with her. 

In the choice of a husband for her, three thousand 
men came together and deposited their staves with the 
high priest. Joseph, who was highly esteemed as an 
elder, would not take his staff again; but the high 
priest Abiathar called after him with a loud voice, and 
when he received his staff, out of the top of it there 
came a dove, whiter than snow, and of great beauty, 
which flew a long time about the pinnacles of the tem- 
ple, and then soared away to heaven. Joseph took 
Mary, and also five other virgins to whom the high 
priest had assigned work, namely, Rebecca, Sephiphora, 
Susanna, Abigail, and Zabel. Mary obtained by lot 
the most honorable work, namely, the sewing of pur- 
ple for curtains of the temple ; and on this account, 
the other virgins called her the queen. On the third 
day, while about her usual employment, an angel of 
wonderful beauty appeared to her, and made to her 
the annunciation, etc., etc. 

Contrast all this fanfaronade of childishness, super- 
stition and foolery, with the few brief, simple, and 
rigidly common-sense notices of Mary, which we find 
in the four canonical Gospels. Can any two kinds of 
writing be more utterly unlike ? 

Christ. We next turn our attention to the account 
which these books give of Christ himself. Here the 
contrast between them and the canonical Gospels 
appears, if possible, in still stronger colors. There is 
nothing of the Christ whom we find in the New Testa- 



220 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

ment. All is puerile, bizarre, extravagant. The real 
dignity, the steady benevolence, the unvarying good 
sense of the New Testament Christ, are wholly un- 
known. The periods of life selected, and the topics 
treated, are wholly different from those of the New 
Testament. 

Infancy and Childhood of Christ These topics oc- 
cur in but two of the canonical Gospels, and are there 
treated very briefly ; but they make the great staple 
of the apocryphal gospels, and are drawn out to a 
most wearisome length. The most minute and char^ 
acteristic of these narratives is the Arabic Gospel of 
the Childhood of the Redeemer. According to this 
book, while the child Jesus was lying in his cradle he 
said to his mother, " I, whom thou hast brought forth, 
am Jesus, the Son of God, the Logos, as the angel Ga- 
briel announced to thee ; and I am sent by my Father 
for the salvation of the world." At his birth his pa- 
rents are in a cave, amid the splendor of lights which 
shine more brightly than the light of the sun. The 
woman called in by Joseph, as soon as she saw that 
Mary was the mother, exclaimed, " Thou art not like 
the daughters of Eve; " to which Mary replied: "As 
none among the children is like my child, so his mother 
has not her like among women." Mary allows the 
nurse to lay her hands on the child, and thus are they 
made clean. The child is circumcised in the cave, and 
the Hebrew woman preserves the foreskin in a vessel 
of spikenard, the same vessel from which afterwards 
Mary the sinner anointed the head and feet of the 
Lord. To the Magi, who came in consequence of a 
prophesy of Zoroaster, Mary gave one of the swad- 



APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 221 

dling cloths in which the child had been wrapped, and 
they received it as the choicest treasure. On their 
return home, they held a festival, and, according to 
their custom in religious worship, kindled a fire, and 
into it they threw the bandage, which, however, re- 
mained unscorched, as if the fire had not touched it. 
They kissed it, spread it over their heads and eyes, 
and said, " This is an undoubted truth, verily it is a 
great thing that the fire can not destroy it." And they 
took the bandage, and with groat reverence preserved 
it in their treasury. 

Next comes the narrative of the journey into Egypt, 
and a loose, disconnected story of the strangest and 
most trivial miracles. The holy family come to a city 
which is the abode of the most distinguished god in 
the land ; and the moment they take lodgings in a 
public house, there is great excitement among the citi- 
zens, and they flock to their god to learn the cause. 
He replies, "An unknown God has arrived here, and 
he is God in truth ; and besides him there is no one 
worthy to be worshipped, for he is indeed the Son of 
God." In that same hour the idol fell to pieces, and 
at his fall came all the inhabitants of Egypt with the 
other citizens running together; and a son of the 
priest, three years old, who was possessed of many 
devils, being seized with his frenzy, ran to the public 
house, where Mary was washing and drying her child's 
linen, one piece of which the demoniac boy caught 
down and placed upon his head, when immediately 
the devils came out of his mouth and fled away in the 
form of rams and snakes. 

The holy family, proceeding on their journey, came 



222 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

to a den of robbers ; and the robbers hearing a noise, 
and supposing the king to be approaching with an 
army, took to flight, leaving behind them their booty 
and their prisoners. The prisoners stood up and be- 
gan to break off each other's fetters, and were about 
to depart with their property, when, seeing the holy 
family drawing near them, they asked Joseph what 
king it was whose perceived approach had put the rob- 
bers to flight. Joseph replied, " He is coming behind 
us." In the city to which they came next, there met 
them a demoniac woman, who could neither live in a 
house nor endure clothing ; but the very sight of Mary 
so completely pacified her, that the devil fled from her 
in the form of a young man. In another city there 
was a nuptial ceremony, but by the influence of Satan 
and the magicians, the bride was dumb. She took the 
Christ-child in her arms, folded him to her bosom and 
kissed him, when immediately the band of her tongue 
was loosed. They spent a night in another city, where 
was a woman whom Satan, in the form of a serpent, 
was accustomed to overpower and embrace ; but she 
took the child in her arms and kissed him, and was 
thus delivered from Satan's power. This same woman 
the next day washed the child Jesus in perfumed 
water, which she kept. A girl whose body was white 
with leprosy, being sprinkled with the water, became 
entirely well. The people said, "Doubtless Joseph 
and Mary and their child are gods, for they do not 
seem to be mortals." The maiden who was healed, 
now attended them, and by the wash-water which had 
cured her, she now performed many miracles ; as, for 
example, she cured the young son of a prince who 



APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 223 

had been leprous from his birth. They came to an- 
other city to spend the night, and put up at the house 
of a man recently married, but, in consequence of 
some poison in his system, he was unable to consum- 
mate his marriage. The presence of the child Jesus 
entirely cured him of his infirmity, and he constrained 
them to stop the next day and feast with him. 

The holy family then met three ladies in distress for 
their brother, who by magic had been transformed 
into a mule, and they were taking care of him very 
tenderly in this form. Mary placed the child on the 
mule and said, " my son, by thy great power restore 
this mule and make him what he was before, a rational 
being ; " whereupon the mule immediately became a 
beautiful young man, and afterwards married the 
maiden before referred to, who had been. dispossessed 
of the devil, and was then attending them. The follow- 
ing night they came upon an encampment of robbers 
under two leaders, Titus and Dumachus. The first by 
a gift restrained the other from attacking the holy 
family, for which Mary blessed him, and Jesus 
said, " Thirty years from now the Jews in Jerusalem 
will crucify me and the two robbers with me, Titus on 
my right hand and Dumachus on my left ; and on that 
day Titus will go before me into paradise." In the 
neighborhood of Matarea, Jesus called forth a fount- 
ain in which his mother washed his clothes ; and from 
the perspiration which there fell from Jesus, there 
sprang up an abundance of balsam. They journeyed 
to Memphis and visited Pharaoh. They abode in 
Egypt three years, and Jesus wrought many miracles, 
which are recorded neither in this Gospel of the Child- 
hood, nor in the Evangelio jperfecto. 



224 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

To the above narrative we add some incidents from 
the Latin History of the Nativity of Mary and the In- 
fancy of the Saviour (No. 5). According to this, 
during the flight to Egypt, the holy family rested near 
a cave, out of which many dragons suddenly emerged, 
whereupon Jesus descended from the lap of his mother*, 
and placed himself before the monsters, when they 
fled, and then turned and worshipped him. Likewise 
lions and leopards honored him, and even acted as his 
guides. Lions mingled with the oxen and other beasts 
of burden which they had with them ; wolves associ- 
ated with the sheep, and they were all equally peace- 
ful and harmless. A tall palm tree, whose fruit was 
beyond reach, at the command of the child Jesus, 
bowed itself down to Mary and allowed her to pluck 
its fruit ; and at a second command it restored itself 
to its original position. From the roots of this palm 
Jesus caused to flow a spring of the freshest and purest 
water. A branch of the same palm, at the command 
of Jesus, was carried into paradise by the angels, there 
to be a sign of victory to the soldiers of the Christian 
warfare. When the wanderers were oppressed by 
heat, Jesus by his word enabled them in one day to 
perform a journey of thirty days. It is also related 
here that when Jesus entered a temple, the idols all 
tumbled down. 

We now return to the Arabic Gospel of the Child- 
hood (No. 7), which proceeds to give an account of 
the return to Bethlehem, and of many miracles wrought 
by the water in which Jesus had been washed. This 
sprinkled upon a child enabled it to remain unhurt in 
a burning oven. A sick child also was healed by 



APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 225 

being put into the bed of Jesus and covered with his 
clothes. Mary often distributed his washing-water as 
a miraculous tincture, and pieces of his clothing as 
amulets against all kinds of harm. A 4 emon i ac b°y 
named Judas, was accustomed in his frenzy to bite at 
those who were near him ; and when he was brought 
near to Jesus he began to snap and strike at him, but 
Satan soon came out of him in the shape of a mad dog. 
This was Judas Iscariot, and the same right side on 
which he struck at Jesus, the Jews afterwards pierced 
with the lance. 

Then follow miracles which belong to his later child- 
hood, and which are distinguished from the preceding 
in this respect, that they are not only performed by 
the power which dwelt in Jesus, but with a more defi- 
nite consciousness and will of his own. Once, in his 
seventh year, he was playing with other boys, and they 
were making, with clay, images of oxen, asses, birds, 
etc., and while each was endeavoring to excel the 
others, the child Jesus said, " The figures which I have 
made I will command to walk." He did so; and to 
the astonishment of the other children, the clay images 
walked off, and returned at his command; he then 
made sparrows which flew about, obeyed his word, and 
received food at his hand. At another time, Jesus 
came into the house of Salem the dyer, and there were 
clothes there which were to receive different colors. 
All these Jesus threw into one dye-pot, whereupon the 
dyer coming in was exceedingly angry; but Jesus 
said to him, " I will give to each piece of cloth the 
color you desire ; " and taking them out, each was 
dyed as the dyer wished. Then the Jews, who saw 
this sign and wonder, praised God. 
15 



226 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE 

Joseph, in his travels to his work, was accustomed 
to take the boy Jesus with him, and when anything 
was made too long or too short, too wide or too nar- 
row, (for he was but a bungling carpenter), the child 
stretched his hands over it and brought it all right. 
Once he had a throne to make for the king in Jerusa- 
lem, and worked upon it two years. When it was 
finished, he found it too small for the place where it 
must be put, and being much cast down about it, the 
child Jesus bade him be of good cheer, and each tak- 
ing hold of an end of the throne, they pulled upon it 
till it came to the right size. The throne was made 
of the figured wood which was in use in the time of 
Solomon. At another time, the boys who were playing 
with him he turned into little goats, and they hopped 
about him and honored him as their shepherd. The 
women seeing this, cried out, " our Lord Jesus, Son 
of Mary, thou art indeed the good shepherd of Israel, 
have mercy on thy handmaidens." Then, at the en- 
treaty of these women, he restored the boys to their 
proper shape. In the month Adar, Jesus collected 
the boys together, as their king. With their clothes 
they spread for him a seat, they made him a crown of 
flowers, placed themselves around him as his guards, 
and compelled all who passed by to do him honor. 
Then came men bearing on a bier a boy who had been 
bitten by a serpent in the woods. They were com- 
pelled to come up and do homage to the little king. 
Jesus commanded them to take the wounded boy back 
to the place where he had received the bite, to force 
the snake from his hole and compel him to suck out 
the poison, which was promptly done, and immediately 



APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 227 

the snake burst asunder. This boy was the Simon 
Zelotes afterwards mentioned in the Gospels. 

Once as the boys were playing, one fell from a roof 
and was killed. The others fled, but Jesus stood by. 
The relatives coming up accused Jesus of throwing 
the child down, but he ordered the boy to arise and 
give testimony, which he did, and affirmed that it was 
another who threw him down. Another time Mary 
sent him for water, but the pitcher, after he had filled 
it, broke in his hands ; so he caught the water in his 
apron and brought it to his mother. One sabbath day 
he was playing with other boys by a brook, and he 
made sparrows which he placed around a little artifi- 
cial pool ; but a son of the Jew Hannas, enraged at 
this profanation of the Sabbath, ran and destroyed the 
pool. Jesus let the sparrows fly, and then said to the 
boy, "As the water has disappeared from this pool, so 
will thy life disappear ; " and from that moment the 
child sickened, and soon after died. One evening as 
Jesus was going home with Joseph, a rough, careless 
boy ran against him, and he said : "As thou hast over- 
thrown me, so shalt thou be overthrown and not rise 
again," and immediately the boy fell down and died. 
Other revengeful acts of the boy Jesus may be found 
in the Gospel of Thomas (No. 2). Joseph at length 
gives Jesus to understand that they could no longer 
be tolerated among parents whose children had been 
slain by his mischievous power, and Jesus answered : 
" I know those are not my words, but thine ; never- 
theless for thy sake I will be silent, but those who 
have complained of me shall receive their punishment ;" 
and the complainers were soon struck blind. Jesus 



228 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

subsequently restored them to sight, but no one after 
that dared provoke him to anger. 

The Gospel of the Childhood and of Thomas have 
many anecdotes of the school-days of Jesus and of his 
being taught to read. A school-master in Jerusalem 
by the name of Zacheus, offered to teach the child, 
and when his parents brought him, the teacher wrote 
the alphabet, and told the new scholar to pronounce 
first AlepJi and then Beth. Jesus said, u Tell me the 
meaning of Aleph, and then I will pronounce Beth." 
The master threatened to punish him for his impu- 
dence ; but Jesus unfolded the meaning of the letters 
Aleph and Bet\ and described their different forms 
and positions in a way the master had never heard of 
nor read in books ; and then he pronounced the whole 
alphabet. The master then said, " I believe this boy 
was born before Noah ; " and sent him back to his 
parents because he was more learned than all teachers, 
and had no need of instruction. It fared worse with 
another more able teacher, who on a like occasion 
struck the boy Jesus, and at once his hand was with- 
ered and he died, so that Mary said, " "We will not any 
more let him go out of the house, for all who resist 
him are punished with death."" A third teacher, who 
hoped to gain the boy's affections, was so astonished 
at his learning and the knowledge of the law which he 
manifested to all the by-standers, that he entreated 
Joseph to take him away. Jesus smiled and praised 
the teacher, and said he had spoken well ; and on his 
account he healed the others. When at the age of 
twelve he was in the temple at Jerusalem, he asked 
questions on the different sciences ; he explained the 



APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 229 

law and the mysteries in the prophetical books, the 
depth of which no created mind can sound ; he ex- 
plained to an astronomer all the relations and move- 
ments of the heavenly bodies, and the rules of astrol- 
ogy which are thence derived ; he showed knowledge 
of all parts of the human body, the fluids and solids, 
the bones, nerves and veins — all the faculties of the 
soul and their relation to each other and to the body ; 
in short, all kinds of knowledge were entirely familiar 
to him ; as the narrative expresses it, the physical and 
the metaphysical, the hyperphysical and hypophyseal, 
so that a learned philosopher present arose and said, 
" Lord, from this time onward, I am thy scholar and 
thy servant." 

From this time Jesus began to withhold the manifes- 
tations of his knowledge and his power till his thirtieth 
year. 

The Death of Christ and his Descent to Hades, The 
account of these we find in the Greek Gospel of Nico- 
demus (No. 3). Pilate commands an officer to bring 
Jesus before him, but with gentleness. The officer 
spreads a cloth before Jesus for him to walk on. The 
Jews complain of this ; and Pilate, asking him why he 
had done it, he replied, that he had witnessed the en- 
trance of Jesus into Jerusalem, and noticed how he 
was honored. Jesus was made to advance without the 
cloth, but as he stepped between the soldiers who held 
the standards, these eagles themselves bowed down to 
do him honor. The Jews, observing this, raised their 
voices in anger against the standard-bearers. Pilate 
called them before him, and inquired why they had 
done this ; and they assured him that they, as pagans, 



230 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

knew no reason for honoring Jesus, but the standards 
had done it of themselves. Then Pilate leaves it to 
the chief of the Jews to make trial for their own satis- 
faction, and they select twelve of their strongest and 
bravest men, and commit the two standards, each to a 
company of six, to hold them before Pilate. They 
are threatened with death if they allow the standards 
to bow. But when the officers bring in Jesus, again 
the standards bow and worship him. Now the Jews 
complain of Jesus that he is a magician ; that his birth 
was attended with infamy ; that he was born in Beth- 
lehem, and was the cause of the massacre there ; that his 
parents fled to Egypt because they dared not confide in 
the people ; that he had profaned the Sabbath, etc. Dur- 
ing this strife Pilate asked Jesus, "What is truth ?" Jesus 
answered, " Truth is from heaven." Pilate again ; u Is 
there not truth on earth also ? " And Jesus answered, 
"Mark how those who have the truth on earth, are 
judged by those who have the power on earth." 

Then follows the narrative of the crucifixion and 
resurrection. After this, Joseph of Arimathea had a 
vision of Jesus, who appeared to him in a splendid 
light. Joseph sank down and knew not Jesus, but 
Jesus raised him up and said, "Fear not, Joseph, see 
me, who I am." Joseph cried ort, "Rabboni, Elias." 
He replied, " I am not Elias, but Jesus of Nazareth, 
buried by you." For proof Jesus led Joseph to the 
tomb in which his body had lain, and showed him the 
clothes in which the corpse had been wrapped, and 
then led him back to his house, and blessing him sepa- 
rated from him. Joseph of Arimathea afterwards 
related to Annas and Caiaphas, that Jesus had not risen 
from the dead alone, but had called several others to 



APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 231 

life, who had appeared in Jerusalem, among them two 
sons of the high priest Simeon, who had taken Jesus 
in his arms when he was a child. They were then 
living in Arimathea, but were silent as the dead, and 
engaged wholly in prayer. Joseph, Nicodemus, An- 
nas and Caiaphas went immediately to Arimathea, and 
found them praying, and brought them reverently into 
the synagogue at Jerusalem, where, with closed doors, 
they adjured them to disclose the particulars of their 
resurrection. Charinus and Lenthius (these were their 
names), when they heard this, trembled and groaned, 
and they looked towards heaven and made the sign 
of the cross on their tongues. They then demanded 
writing materials, and when these were brought, they 
wrote in substance the following narrative : 

They were with the fathers in the dark abyss, when 
suddenly a golden sunlight entered and shone around 
them. Father Adam, the patriarchs and prophets, 
arose and announced the arrival of the Deliverer ; and 
their father Simeon, who had taken the infant Jesus 
in his arms, joined in the announcement. The whole 
multitude of the saints rejoiced ; John the Baptist also 
stepped up and declared what had happened at the 
baptism, and that he had come there before Jesus to 
announce his arrival. Then Adam through Seth in- 
formed the patriarchs and prophets what he had heard 
from the archangel Michael, when in his weakness he 
had sent him to the gates of paradise to get for him 
some oil from the tree of mercy. Seth related that 
he was then referred to the coming of Christ on earth ; 
he should bring to believers the oil of mercy, and 
should also lead father Adam into paradise to the tree 



232 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

of mercy. Satan now commanded hell to arm against 
Jesus, who had boasted that he was the Son of God, 
though still a man who was afraid of death ; he had 
himself tempted him while on earth, and excited 
against him his ancient people the Jews. Yet hell 
was afraid, for she had felt the power of Jesus, and 
could not retain Lazarus against his will. Finally the 
Lord of glory arrived in the shape of a man, enlight- 
ened the eternal darkness and loosed the perpetual 
bonds. Death and hell acknowledged themselves con- 
quered, and against their will celebrated the glory of 
Jesus. Jesus smote death by his majesty, gave over 
Satan to the power of hell, and took Adam with him 
into his glory. He called to . him all the saints who 
bore his image and likeness, he took Adam by the 
right hand and blessed him with his righteous descend- 
ants. Adam returned thanks, and all with him bowed 
the knee to Jesus. Then he marked them with the 
sign of the cross, and led them out of hell with Adam 
at their head. David uttered a song of praise, so did 
Habakkuk, Micah, and the other prophets, all the saints 
joining in. The Lord then delivered Adam and the 
saints to the archangel Michael, who led them into 
paradise. Here they were met by two very old men, 
who, on being asked who they were, replied that they 
were Enoch and Elijah ; they had not yet tasted death, 
and were to be kept alive till the coming of Anti- 
Christ, with whom they were to fight, and to be slain 
by him, and then, after three days and a half, they 
would be taken up into the clouds alive. During this 
conversation there came along a poor, wretched look- 
ing man, bearing on his shoulder the sign of the cross, 



APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 233 

and resembling in appearance a robber. On being 
questioned he acknowledged that he was the thief 
whom the Jews had crucified with Christ, that Jesus 
had sent him into paradise, that the angel of paradise 
had admitted him on account of the sign of the cross ; 
and had informed him that Adam with his righteous 
and holy sons would soon arrive. 

u These are the divine mysteries which we, even I, 
Charinus and Lenthius, saw and heard ; more we dare 
not tell, according to the commandment of the arch- 
angel Michael. But repent, and make acknowledg- 
ment and give honor to God, that he may have mercy 
upon you." 

Charinus gave what he had written to Annas, Caia- 
phus and Gamaliel, and Lenthius gave his manuscript 
to Nicodemus and Joseph, when suddenly they were 
transfigured in glory and were no more seen. The 
two writings, on being compared, were found to cor- 
respond exactly, without the difference of a single 
letter. 

REMARKS ON THE APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS, AS COMPARED 
WITH THE CANONICAL. 

The above is a full and faithful narrative of all that 
these apocryphal gospels contain ; more full perhaps 
than some may think necessary or will have patience 
to read. But as the idea has been seriously advanced 
by Strauss and enlarged upon by others, that these 
apocryphal books are of very much the same kind, 
and got up in very much the same way as the canoni- 
cal, it is time that the friends of evangelical truth fully 
understood the matter ; and it can be understood only 



234 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

by examination. The books are as yet in but few 
hands ; some of them are published only in foreign 
and difficult languages, and it is desirable that the ab- 
stract, which we give, should be sufficiently full to 
make a fair and complete representation of what they 
actually contain. Such a representation we claim to 
have made, in the preceding pages. 

Now let any candid man, with a reasonable share 
of common sense, carefully read the narratives above 
given, and compare them with our four Gospels, con- 
tained in the New Testament, and what will he say to 
the allegation of Strauss, and those like him ? Is there 
anything to be said, except this, that the clumsiest 
counterfeit of a bank note which was ever issued, a 
counterfeit so gross that the most juvenile clerk of a 
country store can detect it as well as the most expe- 
rienced banker, can not be more unlike the genuine 
note than these apocryphal gospels are unlike the 
canonical ? In the great mass, there are some very 
few touches which seem to indicate a tradition above 
the ordinary level ; but as a whole, in every aspect of 
the case, they present a perfect contrast. So far from 
possessing any of the excellencies of the canonical 
Gospels, there is not resemblance sufficient to make 
them even caricatures. Instead of simplicity, we have 
bombast ; instead of strong, good sense, silliness ; in- 
stead of purity, filthiness ; instead of manliness, puer- 
ility; instead of dignity, meanness; instead of self- 
forgetfulness, self-exaltation; instead of generosity, 
spitefulness ; instead of elevated, sublime sentiment, 
poor, degrading nonsense. Indeed, while the genuine 
Gospels are fully equal to and even above the delicacy 



APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 235 

and true refinement and intellectual and moral eleva- 
tion of the most cultivated nations and ages, the apoc- 
ryphal generally fall below almost the lowest, and 
could scarcely find anywhere a public, mean enough 
to receive and relish them, except in the dark corners 
of the declining Roman empire, where they first orig- 
inated, or the equally dark corners of the modern pa- 
pacy and Mormonism. 

Moreover, if the genuine Gospels were of the same 
character as the aprocryphal, how could the philo- 
sophic historian, from such a beginning, account for the 
development of such an institution as the Christian 
church ? 

The Christian church exists ; Hegel himself could 
not deny that, nor reason the fact into non-existence. 
The Christian church has existed for a long time ; it 
has had a history, it has exerted influence, it has had 
a character ; and here are results to be accounted for, 
events which have had a cause ; and is the cause to 
be sought in such stuff as these apocryphal gospels are 
made of? Are these results to be accounted for by 
ascribing them to such persons as are described in 
these books, or such minds as produced these writings ? 
With even more reason might you attribute the plan- 
ning and rearing of such edifices as Westminster abbey 
and St. Paul's church, and the new parliament house, 
to such characters as Mr. Pickwick and Mr. Jingle, the 
Artful Dodger and Fagin the Jew. There is reason 
in all things that are really things ; and that which 
has no reason in it, is nothing (an Unding), and neither 
deserves nor needs an answer. 



236 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE 



COMPARISON OF THE CANONICAL GOSPELS WITH THE FRAG- 
MENTS OF GOSPELS SUPPOSED TO BE LOST. 

Besides these apocryphal gospels, which a mere in- 
spection and comparison with the genuine show to be 
worthless and of comparatively late origin, there are 
preserved in ancient writers the names and certain pas- 
sages of others, which seem nearer the apostolic period 
and more worthy of notice. That there were written 
memorials of our Saviour's ministry anterior to some of 
our canonical Gospels, is plain from the declaration of 
Luke in the prologue to his Gospel ; and that these 
memorials were imperfect and unsatisfactory is equally 
evident from the same authority. To be fully satisfied 
on this head one need only carefully read the verses 
referred to, Luke i. 1-4. 

It is not probable that Luke had here in mind Mat- 
thew and Mark, for two could not with propriety be 
called many (noXtoz) ; and had he referred to these 
divinely authorized historians, he could hardly have 
assigned it as his reason for writing, that Theophilus 
might know the certainty (&(r(p&leia^ of the things 
wherein he had been instructed ; for as far as the cer- 
tainty is concerned, it could be as well ascertained 
from Matthew or Mark as from Luke. Luke, when he 
wrote, might not have known that Matthew and Mark 
had written before him ; and it would seem from his 
introductory remarks, that Theophilus, his friend, had 
not yet found access to any written account of Christ, 
except such imperfect and fragmentary notices as had 
been penned by different men without divine authority. 
That such notices should have been written is in itself 



APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 237 

in the highest degree probable ; and existing as they 
must only in manuscript and in private hands, it is 
also certain that after the authentic Gospels were pub- 
lished, they would generally cease to be transcribed 
and would finally perish. Yet portions of them would 
probably remain extant for a considerable period ; in 
certain places and by some persons, they would most 
likely be preferred to the true Gospels ; and combined, 
augmented, and variously fashioned, they might hold 
their position several generations, before they would 
finally perish. 

The earlier Christian writers, as Justin Martyr, Ire- 
naeus, Clement of Alexandria and Tertullian, make 
allusions and even quotations, which seem to establish 
the fact of the existence of such narratives in their 
time; and when we come down to the time of 
Origen and Jerome, we find gospels mentioned by 
name which differ both from the canonical and the 
apocryphal as we now have them. In the first homily 
on Luke, published with the works of Origen and 
ascribed to that author, there is the following state- 
ment; "Many undertook to write gospels, but all 

were not received so that you may know 

that not four gospels only but many were written, 
The church has four gos- 
pels, the heretics many ; one of which is inscribed 
according to the Egyptians, another, according to the 

tivelve apostles I know a certain gospel which 

is called according to Thomas, and according to Mat- 
Uiiasy The last two of these may properly be called 
apocryphal, but the first two seem not with strict justice 



238 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

to come under that designation, inasmuch as it seems 
probable that the first was mainly an Egyptian edition 
of the Gospel of Mark, and the second nearly identical 
with the Hebrew Gospel of Matthew. In his preface 
to Matthew Jerome says: "There were many who 
wrote gospels, .... which, being edited by differ- 
ent authors, became the sources of diverse heresies, as 
that according to the Egyptians, and Thomas, and Bar- 
tholomew, and also the twelve apostles. 11 In his work 
De Vir. lllust. (c. 2), he makes mention of a "gospel 
which is called according to the Hebrews, which was 
lately translated by me into both the Greek and Latin 
languages." Eusebius, speaking of the Ebionites (Hist. 
Ecc. iii. 29), says : " They use only the gospel which is 
according to the Hebrews." 

Of those writings, which may be supposed to have 
some connection with the " many " alluded to by Luke, 
we will present a translation of some fragments still 
preserved from that according to the Hebreivs, from the 
one according to the Egyptians, and the memorabilia 
(&rtopvr][iovs6{i<xm) quoted by Justin Martyr. We shall 
add a brief notice of the Diatessaron of Tatian and of 
the gospel of Marcion, which last, being for substance 
an abridged edition of Luke, has been learnedly and 
laboriously restored and edited by Aug. Hahn, and 
published entire by Thilo in his Codex Apoc. Nov. Test. 
i. 401-486. 

GOSPEL ACCORDING TO THE HEBREWS. 

Neither this gospel itself, nor Jerome's translation 
of it, have for many centuries been seen ; and all the 
knowledge which we can now obtain of its contents, 



APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 239 

must be derived from incidental quotations, like those 
which we herewith translate. 

Clemens Alex. (L. ii. Strom, p. 380): u In the gos- 
pel according to the Hebrews, it is written, He that 
hath admired shall reign ; and he that hath reigned shall 
have rest." 

Origen (in Johan. vol. iv. p. 63) : "But if any one 
will go to the gospel according to the Hebrews, where 
the Saviour himself saith: Now my mother, the Holy 
Ghost, took me by one of my hairs, and brought me to 
the great mountain even Tabor." 

In Matth. xix. 19 (vol. iii. p. 691): "It is written 
in a certain gospel, which is called according to the 
Hebrews (if yet it may please any one to take it, not 
as authority, but as an illustration of the question pro- 
posed), and it says : One of the rich men said to him, 
Master, doing what good thing shall I live ? He said 
to him, Man, fulfill the law and the prophets. He 
replied to him, I have done it. He said to him, Go, 
sell all which thou possessest, and divide among the 
poor, and come, follow me. But the rich man began 
to scratch his head, and it did not please him. And 
the Lord said to him, How canst thou say I have ful- 
filled the law and the prophets, when it is written in the 
law, thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself; and be- 
hold many of thy brethren, the sons of Abraham, are 
covered with filth, dying with famine, and thy house 
is filled with many good things, and nothing almost 
goes out of it to them ? And turning to Simon his 
disciple, who sat by him, he said, Simon, son of John, 
it is easier that a camel go through the eye of a needle, 
than a rich man go into the kingdom of heaven." 



240 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Epiphanius (Haeres. xxx. 13) : "In the gospel with 
them (the Ebionites) called according to Matthew, yet 

not entire and pure, but adulterated they 

call it the Hebrew (gospel) . . . it is contained thus : 
There was a certain man, Jesus by name, and he was 
about thirty years old, who chose us. And going into 
Capernaum he went into the house of Simon, who is 
called Peter, and opening his mouth he said : Passing 
along by the sea of Tiberias, I chose John and James, 
the sons of Zebedee, and Simon and Andrew and Simon 
Zelotes, and Judas Iscariot ; and thee, Matthew, sit- 
ting at the receipt of custom, I called and thou didst 
follow me. Wherefore I will that ye be twelve apos- 
tles for a testimony unto Israel. And John was bap- 
tizing, and the Pharisees went out to him and were 
baptized, and all Jerusalem. And John had raiment 
of camel's hair, and a leathern girdle about his loins. 
And his food, it says, was wild honey, whose taste was 
that of manna, as honey-cakes with oil ; and thence 
they may change the word of truth to a lie, and in- 
stead of locusts (&xgidu)v s ) they may make it cakes Qy^gidag^ 
with honey. But the beginning of the gospel with 
them is this : It came to pass in the days of Herod, the 
king of Judea, John came baptizing the baptism of 
repentance in the river Jordan, who was said to be of 
the race of Aaron the priest, the son of Zachariah and 
Elizabeth; and all came to him. And after saying 
many things, it goes on, The people being baptized, 
Jesus also came and was baptized. And when he went 
up from the water, the heavens were opened, and he 
saw the Holy Spirit of God in the form of a dove de- 
scending and coming to him. And there was a voice 



APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 241 

from heaven saying, Thou art my beloved Son, in thee 
I am well pleased. And again, I this day have begot- 
ten thee. And immediately a great light illumined 
the place. Which seeing, it says, John said unto him, 
Who art thou, Lord ? And again there was a voice 
from heaven to him, This is my beloved Son, in whom 
I am well pleased. And then it says, John falling 
down before him, says, I pray thee, Lord, baptize 
thou me. But he forbade him, saying, Suffer it, for 
thus it is becoming that all things be fulfilled." 
' xxx. 14 : " Cutting off the genealogies in Matthew, 
they begin : To make the beginning, as I said before, 
saying, It came to pass, it says, in the days of Herod 
king of Judea, in the high priesthood of Caiaphas, a 
certain man, John by name, came baptizing the bap- 
tism of repentance in the river Jordan, and so on." 

xxx. 16: a That which is called the gospel with 
them, contains this : I have come to destroy the sacri- 
fices, and if ye will not cease to sacrifice, wrath will 
not cease from you." 

Jerome (Contra Pel. iii. 2) : " In the gospel accord- 
ing to the Hebrews the history narrates, Behold the 
mother of the Lord and his brethren said to him, John 
Baptist is baptizing for the remission of sins ; let us go 
and be baptized by him. But he said to them, What 
have I sinned that I should go and be baptized by 
him?" 

Comm. in Isa. xl 1 : ''According to the gospel which 
the Nazaraeans read, the fount of every Holy Spirit 
shall be upon him. Moreover we find these things 
written : And it came to pass when the Lord ascended 
from the water, the fount of every Holy Spirit de- 
16 



242 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

scended and rested upon him and said to him, My Son 
in all the prophets I was expecting thee, that thou 
shouldst come, and I should rest upon thee. For thou 
art my rest, thou art my first born Son, who shalt reign 
forever." 

Comm. in Mich. vii. 6 : " In which (gospel accord- 
ing to the Hebrews) it is said in the person of the 
Saviour, My Mother, the Holy Spirit, took me lately 
by one of my hairs." 

Comm. in Ephes. v. 3 : "Also in the Hebrew gospel 
we read, that the Lord, speaking to the disciples, said, 
You may never rejoice except when you see your 
brother in charity." 

De Yir. 111. c. 2 : u The gospel according to the He- 
brews, after the resurrection of the Saviour, reports : 
But the Lord when he had given the linen cloth to a 
servant of the priest, went to James and appeared to him. 
For James had sworn that he would not eat bread from 
that hour in which he had drank the cup of the Lord, 
until he had seen him arise from them that sleep. And 
again, a little after, the Lord said, Bring a table and 
bread. And immediately it adds, He took the bread 
and blessed and break and gave to James the just, 
and said to him, My brother, eat thy bread, for the Son 
of Man has risen from them that sleep." 

Con. Pel. iii. 2 : u And in the same volume (Gos- 
pel of the Hebrews), he says, If thy brother sin against 
thee in word, and make satisfaction to thee seven times 
in a day, receive him. Simon, his disciple, said to 
him, Seven times in a day ? The Lord answered and 
said unto him, Yes, I say unto thee, until seventy times 
seven! For even in the prophets, after they are 



APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 243 

anointed with the Holy Ghost, is found matter of 



sin. 



Comm. in Matt. vi. 11 : " In the (Hebrew) gospel, the 
man who had the withered hand, is said to be a brick- 
layer (caementarius), and he prayed for help in this 
manner : I was a brick-layer, earning my living by my 
hands; I pray thee, Jesus, that thou wouldst restore 
health to me, that I may not basely beg my bread." 

Ep. 120, ad Hedib. : "In the (Hebrew) gospel we 
read, not that the veil of the temple was« rent, but that 
the lintel of the temple, of wonderful magnitude, was 
broken down." 

From the above extracts, it is manifest that the Gos- 
pel according to the Hebrews was vastly superior to the 
latter apocryphal gospels, of which an abstract has 
already been given ; and greatly inferior to the canoni- 
cal Gospels of our New Testament. The ground- work 
of it would seem to have been the Hebrew Gospel of 
Matthew, in some places mutilated, and in others en- 
larged by augmentations from a tradition not then 
remote. There were probably several different recen- 
sions of it ; and it seems to have been substantially the 
same with that which was sometimes called the gospel 
acccording to the twelve apostles. 

THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO THE EGYPTIANS. 

Epiphanius, in speaking of the Sabellians, has the 
following passage (Haer. L. xxii. 2) : " Their whole 
error, and the power of their error, they derive from 
certain apocryphal books, especially from one called 
the Egyptian Gospel, to which some give this name. 
For in it are contained many such things, as it were 



244 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

mysteriously in a jumble, from the person of the 
Saviour, as that he declared to his disciples that he 
was the Father, and he the Son, and he the Holy 
Ghost." 

Clemens Alex. (Strom, iii. 6, etc., p. 445, 52, 53): 
u To Salome, inquiring how long death should have 
power, the Lord said, As long as you women bear chil- 
dren. .... Moreover, she saying, I have done 
well in not bearing children, the Lord answered, say- 
ing, Eat every herb, but that which is bitter thou 
mayest not eat ; by which words he signifies, that celib- 
acy or marriage is a matter within our own choice, 
neither being enforced by any prohibition of the other. 
This, I suppose, is contained in the gospel according to 
the Egyptians." 

Clemens Romanus. In the second epistle, ascribed 
to this author (vi. 12), there are two quotations from 
a certain gospel, which, when compared with what is 
said of the Egyptian gospel by Clemens Alexandrinus, 
learned men have inferred to be from that work. The 
first is as follows : " For the Lord saith, ye shall be as 
lambs in the midst of wolves. Peter answered and said, 
What if the wolves shall tear the lambs in pieces ? 
Jesus said unto Peter, Let not the lambs, after they 
are dead, be afraid of the wolves. And ye also, fear 
not them that kill you, and are then able to do noth- 
ing to you ; but fear him who hath power, after that 
ye are dead, to cast both soul and body into hell-fire.* 
The second passage is this : " Wherefore also he saith 
thus : Keep the flesh pure and the soul unspotted, that 
ye may receive eternal life." 

The above is nearly all that remains of the gospel 



APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 245 

according to the Egyptians ; and it is not absolutely 
certain that all even of these passages are from that 
work, for Clemens Alexandrinus only supposes, and 
the source of the quotations of Romanus is wholly 
conjectural. So far as we are able to judge, this Egyp- 
tian gospel was still more faulty than that of the He- 
brews. 

Besides these, there are mentioned by ancient writers 
a gospel of Peter (Theodore! Haeret. Fab. ii. 2), and a 
gospel of Oerinthus (Epiphan. xxvii. 5 ; xxx. 14) ; but 
no extracts are given from them, and from what is 
said about them, it would seem that the latter was 
closely connected with the gospel of the Hebrews, and 
the former with that of the Egyptians. According to 
this, the gospel of Cerinthus would have some connec- 
tion with our canonical Matthew, and the gospel of 
Peter with our canonical Mark. (Guericke, Einleit. N. T. 
198, 199.) 

MEMORABILIA OF JUSTIN MARTYR. 

This father in his writings frequently refers to the 
deeds and words of Christ, and cites passages from 
certain apostolic writings, which he calls memorabilia 
or memoirs and also gospels. These writings he affirms 
were the work of apostles and of companions of apos- 
tles. Two passages from his second Apology may be 
sufficient to illustrate the manner in which he refers to 
these authorities. For the apostles, in the memoirs com- 
posed by them, which are called gospels, have thus handed 
down, etc. For in the memoirs which I say were compos- 
ed by the apostles or by those who accompanied them, etc. 

Some of the passages which Justin quotes, are literal 



246 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

transcripts from our canonical Matthew; many are 
quotations, with slight verbal differences, from Mat- 
thew and Luke ; some combine the sense of passages 
found in two or more of the Gospels ; and others 
merely give the meaning of a text without attempting 
to give the words. There are still others which differ 
very much from our present Gospels, and some few, 
of which no trace can be found in our canon. Of the 
two kinds last mentioned we will give a full selection, 
and specimens of the others. 

By comparing all the quotations, it would seem that 
Justin used mainly our Matthew, and was quite familiar 
with Luke ; while he makes very little direct use of 
Mark, and still less of John. He seems also to h#ve 
had traditionary reports of some passages in the life 
of Christ not contained in our Gospels, and access to 
some writings not now extant, as perhaps the original 
Hebrew Gospel of Matthew, and some of the "many" 
referred to by Luke in the introduction to his Gospel. 
All this is very easily accounted for by the fact that 
Justin was a native and resident of Palestine, where 
these traditions and the writings from which he draws, 
originated and were longest preserved ; while, of the 
two Gospels which he passes over almost without no- 
tice, the one (Mark) was written and published for the 
use of the Latins, the other (John) was originally de- 
signed for the Greeks of Asia Minor. 

We begin our extracts with the sentences which 
differ most widely from our canonical gospels. 

Dial. c. Tryph. : " And then the child, having been 
born in Bethlehem, since Joseph had not in that village 
a place to lodge, was lodged in a certain cave near the 



APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 247 

village. They being there Mary brought forth the 
Christ, and laid him in a manger Qp&Tvtf) where the 
Magi, coming from Arabia, found him." 

u Then Jesus came to the river Jordan, where John 
was baptizing, and when he went down to the water, 
a fire was kindled in the Jordan ; and while he was 
ascending from the water, his apostles write, the Holy 
Ghost like a dove flew upon him .... and at the 
same time a voice came out of the heavens, Thou art 
my Son, I this day have begotten thee." 

(Jesus) " being among men, did carpenter's work, 
making ploughs, and yokes, by these things even 
teaching the symbols of righteousness and an indus- 
trious life." 

" And they, seeing these things take place, said it 
was a magical fantasy, for they dared to call him a 
magician and a deceiver of the people." 

" Christ said, In what things I apprehend you, in 
those also I shall judge you." 

The matters in the above statements, to which there 
is nothing corresponding in our canonical Gospels, are 
evidently traditionary notices ; and some of them very 
closely resemble what the fathers quote from the gos- 
pel according to the Hebrews. 

We proceed to give extracts, of which the sense is 
found in the canonical Gospels, though not always in 
one passage nor in the same words. 

Apol. ii. : "Be not anxious as to what ye shall eat, 
or wherewith ye shall be clothed. Are ye not better 
than birds and beasts ? yet God feedeth them. Be 
not anxious, then, as to what ye shall eat or wherewith 
ye shall be clothed ; for your heavenly father knoweth 



248 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

that ye have need of these things ; but seek ye the 
kingdom of heaven, and all these things shall be added 
unto you ; for where the treasure is, there is also the 
mind of the man." 

" Many will say to me, Lord, Lord, have we not eaten 
and drank in thy name, and wrought miracles ? and 
then I will say to them, Depart from me ye workers 
of iniquity. There shall be weeping and gnashing of 
teeth, when the righteous shall shine like the sun, and 
the wicked shall be sent into eternal fire. For many 
shall come in my name, being clothed outwardly with 
the skins of sheep, but inwardly are ravening wolves. 
By their works ye shall know them. Every tree not 
bearing good fruit, is hewn down and cast into the 
fire." 

" Be not afraid of those who destroy you, and after 
that are not able to do anything ; but fear him who 
after death, is able to cast both soul and body into 
hell." 

These extracts all have the appearance of being 
quoted from memory out of different parts of the 
canonical Matthew and Luke, without reference to the 
particular place, or any attempt at verbal accuracy. 

Apol. ii. : "Whosoever is angry, shall be obnoxious 
to the fire." 

" For whosoever heareth me and doeth what I say, 
heareth him that sent me." 

" Woe to you, scribes and pharisees, hypocrites ; for 
ye tithe seasoning and rue ; but consider not the love 
of God and the judgment." 

u Many false Christs and false apostles shall arise, 
and shall lead astray many of the faithful." 



APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 249 

" For Christ also said, Except ye be born again, ye 
can not enter into the kingdom of heaven. But it is 
plain to all, that it is impossible for those who have 
once been born, to enter again into the womb of those 
that bear them. 1 ' 

Dial. c. Tryph. : " A certain one saying to him Good 
Master, he answered, Why callest thou me good ? there 
is one good, my Father who is in heaven." 

These are the quotations by Justin which differ most 
widely from the text of our canon. He quotes 
often, generally without any variation in sense, 
and frequently with literal exactness. Very many 
verses of the New Testament are found complete in 
his writings. It is evident, on comparison of the 
whole, that his memorabilia or memoirs were the same 
Gospels which we now have, with perhaps the edition 
of a Hebrew Matthew ; and when he gives what is not 
in our Gospels, he copies from the traditions of his own 
times, either oral or written, or both. 

DIATESSARON OF TATIAK 

Tatian is described by Eusebius (Hist. Ecc. iv. 29) 
as once a hearer of Justin Martyr, in good repute among 
Christians ; but after the death of Justin, he became 
an ascetic Encratite, abstaining from flesh and wine, 
and denying the lawfulness of marriage. He wrote 
against the gentiles a book which Eusebius commends, 
the object of which was to prove the superior anti- 
quity of Moses and the prophets to the sages of Greece 
and Rome. He also wrote the Diatessaron (<^& reaaagwv^ 
an abridgement and harmony of the four Gospels ; and 
of this Eusebius speaks disparagingly. 



250 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Theodoret (Haer. Fab. i. 20) informs us that Tatian 
cut off the genealogies of Jesus and the account of 
his birth ; and Bar-Salibi, an oriental writer (Asseman. 
Bibl. Or. i. 57), says his Diatessaron began with the 
first words of John's Gospel,'^ &qxn \ v ° My°s 

Epiphanius (Haer, xlvi. 1) says, that some called his 
xb did. jeao&qwv edayyihov the gospel according to the He- 
brews. 

This, I believe, is all the reliable information we 
have respecting this work of Tatian, which some mod- 
ern critics, as Eichhorn and Schmidt, would have to 
be a biography of Jesus, independent of our canon. 
There is not the least evidence of any such thing, but 
of the exact reverse. The most probable supposition 
is, that it was a harmony of our four canonical Gos- 
pels, somewhat mutilated and modified to suit his 
Encratite views, and based mainly on the Hebrew 
Matthew ; as Tatian, it seems, was taught Christianity 
in Palestine, and by Justin Martyr. In any event, 
certainly, nothing can be made out of it to the dispar- 
agement of our canonical Gospels. 

GOSPEL OF MARCION. 

< 

Marcion, an anti- Judaizing Gnostic, according to the 
uncontradicted testimony of antiquity, published for 
his followers a gospel, which was simply the Gospel 
of Luke, mutilated and changed to suit his own views. 
This is the testimony of both Tertullian and Epipha- 
nius (adv. Marc. iv. 2, 6; Haer. xlii. 11). Some of 
the important parts omitted are cap. i., ii. and iii. 1-9, 
29-35; xv. 11-32; xix. 29-46; xx. 9-18, 37, 38; 
xxii. 35-38, 42-44. Guericke, Einleit. N. T. 206. 



APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 251 

The beginning of Marcion's gospel, according to the 
edition of Hahn, is as follows: "In the fifteenth 
year of the reign of Tiberius Csesar, God came down 
to Capernaum, a city of Galilee, and was teaching on 
the Sabbath days. And they were astonished at his 
doctrine, for his word was with power. And there 
was in the synagogue a man, having a spirit of an un- 
clean devil, and he cried out with a loud voice, say- 
ing : " and so on, word for word, according to Luke 
iii. 1 ; iv. 31-33, etc. In accordance with the above 
representation of the first appearance of Christ in Gal- 
ilee, an ancient writer informs us that "Marcionites 
frequently affirm, that the good God suddenly appeared 
and came down immediately from heaven into the 
synagogue." (Pseudo-Orig. Dial. p. 823 ; Thilo, Codex 
Apoc. N. T. i. 403.) 

The extract given above may be considered a fair 
specimen of the book, and of the manner in which it 
compares with the canonical Luke. It is perfectly 
plain from the testimony of the ancients, and from an 
inspection of the work itself, that it is in no sense a 
rival of our canonical Gospels, nor derived from any 
sources independent of them. 

Of the other early gospels, sometimes alluded to, 
that of Bartholomew, according to the testimony of 
Eusebius (Hist. Ecc. v. 10) and Jerome (De Yir. 111. 
c. 36), was nothing else than the Hebrew Gospel of 
Matthew. Of those ascribed to Matthias and Thomas, 
no authentic trace remains; and there is not the 
shadow of evidence that either of these apostles ever 
wrote a gospel. Those ascribed to Apelles and Basi- 
lides were nothing more than extracts from the canon- 



252 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

ical Gospels, variously mutilated and interpolated. 
None of these, certainly, are fit to hold any rivalship 
with our four which are contained in the New Testa- 
ment. 

Arabia has been prolific in the apocryphal literature 
of the New Testament ; several of the apocryphal gos- 
pels have been preserved to us through the Arabic 
language ; and Mohammed was much indebted to this 
source for his materials in the construction of the Ko- 
ran. Chapters iii. and xix. of that strange book are 
well worthy the perusal of every Christian, for they 
contain a minute account of the families of Christ and 
John, and all the wonderful circumstances attending 
their birth, in the true Arabic fashion. 

In drawing up the preceding account of the gospel 
fragments of the early age, we have been largely in- 
debted to De Wette's learned and vigorous Introduc- 
tion to the New Testament. The German unbelief 
can not now be successfully encountered without the 
help of the German learning. The antidote is scarcely 
to be found except where the poison grows. The 
climes which yield the most noxious plants, are the 
very climes which produce the most effective medi- 
cines, the sweetest fruits, the most luxuriant vegeta- 
tion. 



CHAPTER EIGHTH. 



THE MODERN SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HISTORY OF 
THE NEW TESTAMENT. 



IN THE NEW TESTAMENT. 

To every man who feels the need of religion, and 
can not surrender his reason to the tyrannical and pre- 
posterous claims of the papacy, the four Gospels, as we 
now have them in the New Testament, are of priceless 
value. The human soul, in its wants and sorrows and 
conscious weakness, in view of its brief existence on 
earth, and the dread unknown which awaits it beyond 
the grave, is greatly in want of some objective truth to 
rest upon ; and without it the only wise philosophy is 
that which says, Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow 
we die. If the four Gospels be received as objectively 
true ; if Jesus Christ, as therein described, be an ac- 
tually existing personage, and our ever-living, ever- 
present friend and guide, then we have what we need ; 
then the soul can rest and rejoice ; then the spiritual 
can gain a permanent victory over the physical ; our 
life on earth can be made a time of usefulness and 
peace, and our death a season of triumph and joy. 
Moreover, having Jesus and the Gospels objectively 
true, on their authority we have also the other writings 



254 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

of the New Testament, and the historians, the poets, 
and the prophets of the Old ; and now, with an un- 
mutilated, unimpeachable Bible in our hands, we, like 
our fathers, can march through the world with heads 
erect, and a joyous courage, bidding defiance to Satan, 
and sorrow, and wicked men. 

9 But weaken our confidence in the Gospels ; let them 
be regarded as a jumble of traditions, partly true and 
partly false, then the chief effect of the Christian reli- 
gion is, to raise our hopes only to sink us the deeper 
in despair; to increase our fears, without showing us 
definitely our danger, or teaching us how to escape it ; 
our life on earth is equally unfitted for sensual pleasure 
and for spiritual enjoyment ; and beyond the grave we 
have only just light enough to make the darkness visi- 
ble. With the mere mockery of a revelation which is 
then left us, there are but two classes of men who can 
be satisfied with life as it now exists — namely, those 
whose desires and aspirations never go beyond the 
physical comforts of the external world, and the proud, 
cold, self-sufficient thinkers, whose chief pleasure it is 
to despise the weaknesses of their fellow creatures, and 
think themselves above them. 

Entertaining such views, I confess I never can read, 
or listen to a critique on the sacred writings, and espe- 
cially on the Gospels, without deep feeling. If indiffer- 
ence as to the result, be an essential qualification for a 
good investigator of the Scriptures, then I must give 
up all hope of ever being one. To the result I can not 
be indifferent if I would, for there are all my hopes. 
Who would be expected to be indifferent, if the object 
of the investigation on which he is obliged to enter, 



SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HIST. 255 

were to ascertain whether his father were a cheat, or 
his son a thief, or his wife false ? 

" But we must have a zeal for science ; we must let 
truth work its way ; we must be willing that every 
falsehood, and every mistake, however long and lov- 
ingly cherished, should be torn from our embrace." 
Very true, so we must ; but does a proper regard for 
science, a proper love of truth, a proper hatred of 
error, require the sacrifice of every humanizing and 
ennobling feeling ? Is man, or is he required to be, 
all intellect and ho heart ? To honor the mind, must 
we crucify the soul ? Is he the only anatomist who 
can lay bare to his knife the body of a beloved sister, 
with the same indifference with which he would hack 
upon the carcass of an unknown culprit just snatched 
from its dishonored grave ? I believe no such thing ; 
and while Christ is to me more than father or mother, 
more than wife or child, or my own life even, I do not 
believe that sound philosophy requires me to see that 
holy Gospel, which contains all that I know of him, 
treated by an irreverent critic, as the greedy swine 
would treat a beautiful field of growing corn. Nor 
do I believe that an irreverent, ungodly critic is the 
man to do justice to the Gospels, or tell the truth about 
them fairly, in any sense. He may investigate their 
language, and examine their history, and give correctly 
the results of his verbal criticisms ; but the real sub- 
stance of the Gospels is far above, out of his sight ; 
he can have no sympathy with Christ ; he can have 
no conception of the motives which influenced the 
apostles ; he can have no idea of the feelings which 
animated the sacred writers ; he is a total stranger to 



256 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

the whole soul of that which he criticises. When a 
man who has never seen, can accurately describe col- 
ors, or one who has never had the sense of hearing, 
can give a good account of sounds, or a horse with 
iron-shod hoofs can play tunes on a church organ, then 
I will not refuse to believe that an ungodly critic can 
write a reliable book on the New Testament. It is 
only the very lowest part of the work, that such a 
critic can perform ; and when he comes to the higher 
criticism, the interior life of the word, he is wholly out 
of his sphere. How can a man with no poetry in his 
soul, review a poem ? How can a man with no math- 
ematics, properly estimate a treatise on fluxions ? How 
can one destitute of the first principles of taste, be a 
critic in the fine arts ? And how can a man wholly 
irreligious, be a fit judge of the most religious of all 
books ? Let the Gospels be estimated according to 
their real worth, and the writers upon them according 
to their real worth, and then justice will be done on 
both sides. We will refuse no help, and we will repel 
no truth, though it come from the most ungodly ; but 
we will not idolize intellect which has no heart, nor 
allow profane hands to filch from us our choicest 
treasures. 

There is a decided tendency, in our times, to award 
peculiar consideration and deference to profane writers 
on sacred subjects. If an author with the spirit and 
principles and talent of Yoltaire, were to write a life 
of Christ, or a commentary on the Gospels, or espe- 
cially an introduction to the Old Testament, it would 
be just in accordance with the spirit of the age to 
study and quote such works with more profound 



SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HIST. 257 

respect than is awarded to the writings of Luther, or 
Calvin, or Bengel, or any other writer who loves and 
venerates the Word of God. This whole tendency is 
most particularly to be despised or deplored. 

RELIGIOUS CHARACTER OF THE HEGELIAN PHILOSOPHY. 

The recent assaults on the Gospels have proceeded 
almost entirely from the Hegelian school of philoso- 
phy. The influence of this philosophy extends ' far 
beyond the circle of its professed disciples. It is 
found where the very name of Hegel is almost un- 
known, and where not a syllable of his writings has 
ever been read. It invades Christian and even ortho- 
dox pulpits, and sometimes neutralizes the power of the 
Gospel under the most evangelical forms. It is a proud 
and a godless philosophy ; and, like a cholera miasma 
in the atmosphere, often deals desolation and death 
wfcere its very existence is unsuspected. Though the 
most abstruse of all speculations, it never exists as a 
mere speculation, but immediately proceeds to action 
—and its first acts are the annihilation of human re- 
sponsibility, and of the spiritual world, and of God 
himself. While in some cases it retains the words and 
phrases of the most evangelical faith, it expels from 
them all their meaning, and leaves them the mere 
hieroglyphs of an atheistic mystery. There is a uni- 
verse but no God — there is development but not crea- 
tion. 

In thus describing the religious character of this 

philosophy, I am far from intending a personal attack 

on its great founder. In many of the qualities which 

make up a man, he was among the noblest of men, — 

17 



258 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

a fine physical organization, a prodigious intellect, and 
a generous heart ; and he would probably himself be 
one of the first to protest against the atheistic extremes 
of some of his followers. Nor are his disciples all 
alike. There is the extreme right, the central, and the 
extreme left — or, as I would characterize them, the 
religious, the non-religious, and the anti-religious. On 
the extreme right was Marheinecke, a clear-headed and 
sound-hearted Christian theologian and preacher, one 
of the best historians and one of the most accurate 
reasoners ; and how he could be a Hegelian and the 
author of such works as his History of the Reforma- 
tion and his Christian Symbolih was always a mystery 
to me. There, too, is Goeschel, a truly pious and em- 
inent jurist ; but inasmuch as he could find in Goethe 
an apostle of Christianity, and in the Faust a high de- 
velopment of the Christian spirit, it is not so surprising 
that he can see in Hegel the Christian philosopher. 
Dorner, too, one of the best of men, one of the most 
learned, conscientious and reliable of writers, the au- 
thor of that most admirable work, the Development- 
history of the Doctrine respecting the Person of Christ, 
is said to be a Hegelian of this class. 

The assaults on the Gospels have proceeded from the 
extreme left, represented by such men as the younger 
Feuerbach, and Strauss and Bruno Bauer, F. C. Baur, 
Renan, SchenkeL, etc. This, I suppose, is the legiti- 
mate result of the Hegelian philosophy, and these men, 
whatever Hegel himself might think of them, I regard 
as his true followers. 

But what is the Hegelian philosophy ? I have been 
admonished more than once to treat this philosophy 



SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HIST. 259 

with respect, to admire it at least as an "exquisite 
work of art if not a system of absolute truth." I shall 
do my best in this particular. I have acknowledged 
before, and here repeat the acknowledgment, that I 
have no very definite knowledge of it. It stands be- 
fore me, in its bulk and its unintelligibleness, as a huge, 
shapeless, threatening spectre, most fitly described in 
the words of Yirgil : 

Monstrum horrendum, informe, ingens, cui lumen ademptum. 
(A monster, horrid, hideous, huge and blind.) 

But when I think of the tremendous influence it 
exerts, and the mighty mischief it is making, it assumes, 
to me, (in the language of Milton,) 

" The other shape, 
If shape it may be called, which shape has none 
Distinguishable in member, joint, or limb ; 
Or substance may be called that shadow seems, 
For each seems either ; black it stands as night, 
Fierce as ten furies, terrible as hell, 
And shakes a dreadful dart ; and what seems its head 
The likeness of a kingly crown has on." 

We speak here of the Hegelian philosophy only in 
its connection with religion, and as it now exists. 
Whatever of obscurity may rest over some of its spec- 
ulations, its principal bearings on religion are perfectly 
intelligible, and are carried out to their extreme con- 
sequences with a cool audacity that is almost frightful. 
According to Hegelianism, the subjective is not only 
more than the objective, but the subjective is the whole, 
it is the entire substance, and the objective has no ex- 
istence except as the shadow or reflection or creation 
of the subjective. The great discovery boasted by He- 



260 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

gel and his followers, the great first principle of all 
truth, the honor of whose development Schelling in 
vain attempted to dispute with Hegel, is the absolute 
identity of subject and object, that is, I suppose, the 
thing perceiving and the thing perceived are one and 
the same thing. 

Admitting this as a fundamental principle, what is 
God ? Is God the creator of man, or is man the crea- 
tor of God ? The latter of course. The human mind 
is the only development of God, — only by the work- 
ings of the human soul does God arrive at self-con- 
sciousness ; and if there were no men there would be 
no God, as there can be no color without an eye, and 
no sound without an ear. There seems to be recog- 
nized a sort of natura naturans, a sort of blind, uncon- 
scious, fermenting leaven, constantly working ; but 
this never attains to personality or consciousness except 
in the human soul. 

We will not ourselves undertake to make the state- 
ments of the doctrines of this sect — we will take them 
just as they are made by one of the most able and 
active of the living advocates of the system, in his 
work entitled Das Wesen des Christenthums. This is a 
favorite book among the Germans of our own country, 
and can be obtained in any quantities at our principal 
German bookstores. A brief, but very satisfactory, 
notice of it has been given in the Christian Examiner 
published in Boston, No. clxi. 

Says this writer, " The absolute Being, the God of 
man, is man's own being." " Since God is but our 
own being, the power of any object over us, is the 
might of our own being. In willing, loving, feeling, 



SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HIST. 261 

etc., there is no influence but of ourselves over our- 
selves." a All limiting of the reason rests on error." 
" Every being is all-sufficient to itself." u It is delu- 
sion to suppose the nature of man a limited nature." 
" Religion is the consciousness of the infinite; it is 
and can be nothing but man's consciousness of his own 
infinite being." " If you think infinity, or feel infinity, 
it is the infinity of thought and feeling, nothing else. 
The knowledge of God is the knowledge of our- 
selves ; for the religious object is within us." " God is 
man's revealed inner nature — his pronounced self. 
Religion is the solemn unveiling of the concealed 
treasures of humanity, the disclosure of its secret 
thoughts, the confession of its dearest secrets. The 
Christian religion is the relation of man to his own 
being as to another being." "Religion is the dream 
of the human soul." 

This is not caricature, nor ridicule, nor misrepresen- 
tation. It is just a plain statement of some of the 
prominent doctrines of the system, by one of its most 
able advocates. There is no God ; and the devout 
man, when he thinks he is worshippng God, is simply 
worshipping himself. There is no accountability ; 
there is no individual immortality ; when a man dies, 
his soul is re-absorbed into the great mass of being, by 
the natura naturans to be again, perhaps, in time de- 
veloped, and so on from eternity to eternity. These 
principles are boldly and openly avowed, and find able 
and popular advocates both in Germany and in this 
country. One of the most eminent of the German 
republicans, Dr. Yoight of Giessen, during the sum- 
mer of 1848, declared publicly in the Frankfort par- 



262 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

liament, that there could be no permanent freedom, 
till the idea of God and all responsibility to God were 
entirely banished from the human mind. No wonder 
that the German revolution, with such men to lead it, 
proved a miserable failure. No wonder that the pious, 
intelligent, sober men of Europe, viewed the whole 
movement with distrust, and finally abandoned it alto- 
gether. Atheistic liberty is the worst kind of tyr- 
anny. An editorial article in a political newspaper 
published in Cincinnati, says, "Religion is the cause 
of all the oppression which exists ; inasmuch as it ca- 
joles poor sufferers with the chimerical idea of a heaven 
hereafter ; and the source of religion is want of educa- 
tion, ignorance. This is the origin of all evil." The 
same principles, with a little more regard to religious 
public sentiment, and partially disguised under a garb 
of specious phraseology, are zealously propagated in 
New England, and infect large numbers especially of 
our educated young men. Before they begin to feel 
the need of religion, the foundation of religious faith 
is taken away. For this work of ruin, the genius of 
Hegelianism has peculiar facilities. It can approach 
unperceived, and accomplish its purpose before its 
presence is suspected. It can use the language of any 
theology, even the most orthodox, and convey its own 
ideas in the words of an evangelical faith, and here is 
our danger now. 

One of the phrases already quoted from Feuerbach, 
may serve as an example of the deceptive manner in 
which language may be used. It is this, u God is 
man's inner nature, his pronounced self." Here it may 
be alleged, is the New Testament doctrine of the Lo- 



SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HIST. 263 

gos, the God-man, God revealed ; and in like manner 
we may get the Holy Ghost, as that may be consid- 
ered to be the inner nature of man re-acting upon itself, 
and this may be called that spiritual influence which 
good men crave and pray for. Thus can the Hegelian 
atheist, with most conscientious deceptiveness, use all 
the language of the Trinitarian Christian. 

With this philosophy, testimony is nothing, objective 
narrative is nothing, history is not to be learned from 
external sources, it must be developed from within — 
facts must not be sought for, they must be made ; and 
on this principle these philosophers act with great con- 
sistency and vigor, as we shall see when we come to ex- 
amine their theories of the Gospel history. Another of 
the principles of this philosophy is eminently a practical 
one, namely, that " man is God, and must worship him- 
self." This the Hegelians do with the most enthusiastic 
devotion. Such self-worship was never before witnessed 
on earth. The enormous self-conceit of these men, 
the self-conceit of Hegel himself, the pitiful folly of 
his admirers who pronounced their eulogies over his 
grave, are among the greatest monstrosities which ever 
existed on this planet of monsters, comparable to 
nothing but the lizards larger than ten whales, and the 
frogs bigger than elephants, which are said to have 
existed on the pre-Adamite earth. Self-conceit is a 
symptom of the disease. The venerated Neander, in 
a letter to Prof. Schaff of Mercersburg, justly charac-. 
terizes the system as "the philosophy of a one-sided 
logic, of intellectual fanaticism, and of self -deification." 
My respected friend, Prof. S. himself, I am happy to 
see, takes no exceptions to this view of the subject. 



264 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Indeed, lie himself calls this kind of Hegelianism, an 
" arrogant pantheism, different from atheism only in 
form" — "a lifeless formalism of the understanding, 
that destroys at last all soul in man, and turns him into 
a pure speculator on the open heath, an unfruitful 
thinker of thinking, a heartless critic and fault-finder." 
(Schaff's Kirchenfreund for Jan., 1851, also Mercers- 
burg Review, vol. iii. p. 81, ff.) 

There is no disinterestedness in this philosophy, there 
is no veneration, there is no love. Each being is all- 
sufficient to itself, and each revolves around itself as its 
own centre, and each is at the same time both planet and 
sun, both axis and orbit. And what can come of such 
kind of principles, but selfishness, and animalism, and 
every evil work? 

Now, it is such philosophers as these, who presume 
to sit in judgment on the New Testament, to estimate 
the characters therein portrayed, to determine as to 
what is, and what is not, fitting in a revelation from 
God to man ; to decide with solemn majesty a priori, 
from internal marks only, out of the depth of their 
own consciousness, and with nothing else to aid them, 
as to what is spurious, and what is genuine, in the 
sacred writings ! How well they succeed, we shall see 
as we go on. And we will only say here, that if op- 
posites are the best judges of opposites, if goats are 
the best judges of perfumes, if worms have suitable 
qualifications to decide on the merits of eagles, then 
are these men qualified to sit in judgment on Jesus, 
and the apostles, and the writers of the Gospels. Yet 
their writings are published, translated into different 
languages, and extensively read. In various ways 



SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HIST. 265 

they exert a great influence even over those who never 
read them ; the echoes of their voice reverberate from 
many a newspaper and popular periodical ; their sound 
is heard in many a lyceum, and mechanics' institute, 
and mercantile association, and debating club ; they 
innate the vanity, and heighten the self-conceit, and 
set loose the passions of many a young man in our 
institutions of learning, and in our mercantile and man- 
ufacturing establishments, and produce extensively a 
ruinous infection in the whole intellectual atmosphere 
— not sparing even the theological school, the minis- 
terial study, or the Christian pulpit. 

So many ingenious ways do poor short-lived men de- 
vise, and such infinite pains do they take, to rid them- 
selves of God their heavenly Father, of Christ their gra- 
cious and only Saviour. It is often and justly remarked 
of rogues and freebooters, that they employ far more 
ingenuity, and energy, and perseverance, to get a liv- 
ing by dishonesty, than would be necessary to make 
them securely and reputably wealthy in an honorable 
calling; yet, they are always poor, and in constant 
dread of detection and punishment. So these proud 
thinkers tax their minds and hearts more severely to 
be irreligious, than would be necessary to secure an 
eminent place in the Christian walk ; while they can 
look only for the wages of sin, which is death ; while 
the gift of God, and that only, is life and peace. Ac- 
cording to the Scripture, it is the fool who hath said in 
Ms heart, there is no God j and the same Scripture 
says, The fool is wiser in his own conceit, than seven 
men that can render a reason * and, though you brag a 
fool in a mortar with a pestle among ivheat, yet will not 



266 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Ms folly depart from Mm.. How wonderfully descrip- 
tive of the foolishness of Hegelian pantheistic atheism ! 

ANALYSIS AND CHARACTERISTICS OF THE PRINCPAL HEGE- 
LIAN ASSAULTS ON THE GOSPELS. 

The four Gospels exist, they have for ages existed 
in all the languages of the civilized world, they have 
produced the most astonishing revolutions, they lie at 
the foundation of all modern civilization ; they did not 
arise in a remote antiquity nor in a fabulous era, but in 
the zenith of the Roman empire and in immediate con- 
tact with the Grecian culture. The problem of the 
philosophic sceptic is to account for all this, on any 
other supposition than that of the historical truth of 
the Gospel narrative and the reality of miraculous in- 
terposition. The first regular, systematic, Hegelian 
attempt towards the solution of this great problem was 
made in 1836 by David Frederic Strauss, then a young 
man just commencing his career as a teacher in the 
university of Tuebingen. I was in Germany at the 
time when Strauss's Life of Jesus first appeared, and 
it was exciting as great a commotion among the learned 
of Germany then, as a few years after the prophesying 
of the millenarian Miller excited mong the unlearned 
in America. That was the year fixed on by Bengel 
for the end of the world ; and many who had no faith 
in Bengel or the apostle John, yet devoutly believing 
in Strauss, thought surely the end of Christianity had 
come. Prof. Tholuck told me he considered it the 
most formidable attack the New Testament had ever 
sustained, and he was right heartily at work in answer- 
ing it, and soon after published his excellent book on 



SUBSTITUTES FOE THE GOSPEL HIST. 267 

the Credibility of the Gospel History. The answers 
to Strauss were numerous, almost numberless, the con- 
troversy raged with great vigor for some six or eight 
years ; but now Strauss, before he is an old man, finds 
himself an obsolete and antiquated writer ; as much 
so as was, when he began, the old Paulus whom he 
treated so cavalierly. But though Strauss is already 
intellectually dead and buried, never to rise again, 
among the Germans, he just begins to live among 
those who use the English language, and translations 
of his book are read with the most innocent wonder- 
ment by many of our young men, who have no know- 
ledge of the fact that it has long since been thoroughly 
exposed and exploded in the land of its birth. In the 
track of Strauss, with more or less of divergency, fol- 
lowed Weisse, Gfroerer, Bruno Bauer, Wilke, Schweit- 
zer, Schwegler, Leutzelberger, F. C. Baur, Benan, Schen- 
kel, and many, many others ; the greater part of whom 
remain unto this present, though, as to any influence, 
they have already mostly fallen asleep. 

In analyzing some of the principal Hegelian hypoth- 
eses of the Gospel history, as specimens of the whole, 
we shall avail ourselves liberally of the labors of 
Ebrard, who in his admirable work, entitled Wissen- 
schaftliche Kritilc der evangelisclien Geschichte, has with 
great industry, skill and fairness, epitomized, arranged, 
and made them intelligible. 

(1) HYPOTHESIS OF STRAUSS. 

(a) The facts out of which the Gospel narratives 
have arisen. These according to Strauss, were very 
few, and mainly the following: The Jewish nation, 



268 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

during the reigns of Augustus and Tiberias, had the 
expectation of a national Messiah, predicted in the Old 
Testament, who would be a political deliverer and 
work miracles greater than Moses wrought. At this 
period there was a Jew born at Nazareth in Galilee 
named Jeschuah, (the sceptic sometimes gains consid- 
erably by simply changing the orthography of a well- 
known name) ; and another Jew, by the name of John, 
became a celebrated ascetic preacher and baptizer. 
Jeschuah attached himself to John as one of his disciples; 
and after the imprisonment of the latter, prosecuted 
the same work, and gathered disciples of his own. 
Jeschuah now formed the design of effecting by his 
doctrine the moral regeneration of his countrymen ; 
and being under the influence of the supernatural 
prejudices of his times, imagined that God would in- 
terpose to help him in so worthy an attempt, and to 
re-establish the kingdom of David. This idea corres- 
ponded very nearly to the Messianic expectations of 
the Jews ; and they, hearing him preach from time to 
time, began to think whether he might not be the ex- 
pected Messiah. At first, Jeschuah shrunk from such 
a thought, but gradually became reconciled to it, and 
at length it gained full possession of his mind. He 
was however, entirely destitute of the means of carry- 
ing out this idea in practice, for he had no political 
influence nor any power of working miracles. He saw 
that the all-powerful priest party was daily becoming 
more and more incensed against him ; the unhappy 
fate of the persecuted prophets of the Old Testament 
dwelt on his mind ; some texts of the Old Testament, 
as he began to think, indicated a suffering and dying 



SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HIST. 269 

Messiah ; and, on the whole, he at length anticipated 
a violent death from the hands of his enemies. His 
anticipations were realized, and he perished on the 
cross in early life. 

This, according to Strauss, is the whole of the his- 
torical basis of the Gospels. There were no miracles 
wrought, nor even pretended to be wrought, during 
the lifetime of Jesus ; nor did he, at the commence- 
ment of his career, imagine himself to be the Messiah, 
nor anticipate the sad fate which at length overtook 
him. 

(b) Origin of the miraculous stories of the Gospels. 
The disciples of Jeschuah believed him to be the Mes- 
siah ; and when the first shock of his terrible end and 
of their own bitter disappointment was past, they set 
themselves to devise some method of reconciling actual 
facts with their cherished expectations, and especially 
to see if they could not in some way get the idea of 
suffering and death into their notion of the Messiah. 
They searched the Old Testament, and found many 
passages which represented men of God as plagued, 
persecuted and slain ; and these answered to them for 
Messianic predictions. The Messiah, then, though de- 
parted, was not lost ; he had only gone into his glory ; 
he must still love and care for his own. This idea 
took such complete possession of their minds, that 
some of the women began to imagine they had actu- 
ally seen him after his burial, and they so said to the 
men — and the whole company became so excited and 
talked about the matter so much, and got their imag- 
inations so inflamed, that two or three times, when 
they were gathered together, some object dimly seen 



270 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

in the mountain mist, or some unknown person ap- 
proaching them, gave them the impression that they 
had actually seen the Lord in bodily presence. 

The great miracle of the resurrection, being thus 
generated and born and brought into the world, be- 
comes the fruitful parent of other miracles. Accord- 
ing to the expectation of the Jews, the Messiah must 
work miracles, and if Jeschuah wrought no miracles, 
how could he be the Messiah ? The matter was anx- 
iously thought of, and the remembered words and 
deeds of Jeschuah were scrutinized to see if they 
might contain any germs out of which miraculous nar- 
ratives could naturally grow. He had told them they 
should be fishers of men — happy reminiscence ! what 
more natural than that out of this should grow the story 
of the miraculous draught of fishes ? He had said the 
unfruitful tree should be cut down ; and here we have 
the nucleus of the fig-tree which was cursed and with- 
ered away. True, the apostles could not themselves 
imagine that they had with their own eyes seen these 
miracles ; but knowing as they did, that the Messiah 
must work miracles, they could not doubt that such 
miracles actually occurred. At least, if this was not 
the idea of the apostles, it must have occurred to 
those who had seen but little of Christ while he was 
on earth, and it became the popular belief of most of 
the Christian congregations. 

The miracles being thus set on growing by Strauss, 
their increase is very rapid, and many a scion from the 
Old Testament tree is grafted into the New, and imme- 
diately bears fruit. The hand of Moses, the face of 
Miriam, the body of Naaman, had been leprous, and 



SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HIST. 271 

were cured at a word; and the Messiah of course 
could heal leprosy as well as Moses and Elijah, and 
therefore he did. As Jordan occasioned miraculous 
cures in the Old Testament, so Siloam in the New ; 
as Elijah struck men with blindness in the Old Testa- 
ment, so Christ cured blind men in the New ; as Jero- 
boam's withered hand was restored in the Old Testa- 
ment, so Christ healed withered hands in the New ; 
as Moses divided the Red Sea, so Christ stilled the 
Galilean Sea; as Moses turned water into blood, so 
Christ turned water into wine — and so all the miracles 
of the Old Testament find parallels in the New ; and 
this accounts for very many of the miraculous narra- 
tives of the New Testament. But Strauss does not 
so clearly tell us how to account for these miracles of 
the Old Testament. On his principles, however, it is 
very easy to invent methods, and any invention is pre- 
ferable to the plain, simple, matter-of-fact truth. 

As with the doings of Christ, so with his sayings ; 
those which stand recorded are compositions, ampli- 
fications, from brief hints of his remembered apo- 
thegms. 

Now we have the materials of the Gospel story, and 
after a while, one and another writer works up these 
materials into a written narrative of which we have 
four still extant, ascribed severally to Matthew and 
Mark, to Luke and John. 

(c) Estimate of this hypothesis. Such is the hy- 
pothesis of Strauss ; and this sort of stuff forms the 
staple of two thick, heavy volumes (three in the En- 
glish translation), written with great energy, clearness 
and show of learning, apparently in the most sober 



272 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE , 

earnest, and giving evidence of untiring industry. 
And these volumes have set the world on fire, and in 
the opinion of many have demolished the very founda- 
tions of Christianity, and left the world without a 
Saviour, and almost without a God. What a mon- 
strosity; in every view of it a monstrosity! The 
church of Christ is an accomplished fact, a most migh- 
ty, efficient, working fact — a fact which confessedly 
began at the time alleged — and does the hypothesis 
of Strauss give us means in the least degree adequate 
to account for this fact ? The African who imagines 
that when the moon is in an eclipse, there is a great 
serpent attempting to swallow her, and the child who 
supposes that when it thunders, God is riding in a big 
wagon over a tin bridge, are philosophers of the high- 
est order in comparison with Strauss as he exhibits 
himself in his Leben Jesu. 

What an inexplicable enigma is that Jeschuah, for 
whose existence we are indebted solely to the imagin- 
ation of Strauss. What unheard of, unaccountable 
compounds of knavery and goodness, of silliness and 
greatness, are Strauss's disciples of Jeschuah ! What 
wonderful proficients in stupidity must have been the 
men of that generation, and the generation immedi- 
ately succeeding ! How could myths arise and gain 
credence, in the manner and to the extent which he 
dreams of, in the same generation and the same country 
wherein the facts are alleged to have occurred ? This 
difficulty is felt by Strauss, and he attempts to get rid 
of it by supposing that the stories originated mostly 
in those parts of Palestine east of the Jordan, where 
Christ had personally seldom appeared. The whole 



SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HIST. 273 

of Palestine has scarcely one quarter the extent of the 
State of Maine ; and can men in Maine lie with impunity, 
by going east of the Penobscot ? That was an active, en- 
lightened, revolutionizing, realistic age. The whole 
world was in motion, nations intermingled with each 
other, languages were cultivated— commerce, literature, 
the arts, military operations, kept everything a-stir, and 
there was neither sluggishness, nor stagnation, nor 
mental stupor to favor the growth of a new mythology. 
One might as well look for the growth of mushrooms 
at midday on the pavement of the Royal Exchange in 
London, under the tread of the thousands of feet 
which daily there perambulate, as expect the prosper- 
ous development of such myths as Strauss dreams of, 
in such an age and country as that which witnessed 
the lives and deeds of Christ and his disciples. 

Again, how does Strauss know that matters came 
about in the way which he represents? Who told 
him ? or was he there to see ? What authority does 
he bring, that we should postpone to this single state- 
ment the testimony of prophets and apostles and mar- 
tyrs ? Ah ! he knows it by the Hegelian power of in- 
tuition — by means of which history is constructed 
subjectively, instead of being objectively learned 
from the proper sources. In such constructive his- 
tory, or rather theories of history, we have no confi- 
dence. 

Yet there is in Strauss's book not a little of learn- 
ing, and a great amount of acuteness and ingenuity. 
He starts many difficulties in the Gospel narrative, 
which it requires a clear head and a steady hand and a 
thorough acquaintance with the subject, effectually to 
18 



274 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

obviate. His book has exerted a great and pernicious 
influence in Europe, and is doing the same in this 
country. By means of English translations he is in 
the hands of many young men who are greedily read- 
ing him without any sufficient knowledge of the sub- 
ject to detect the groundlessness of his assumptions 
or the fallaciousness of his reasonings ; and without 
dreaming that he has already been thoroughly refuted 
and antiquated in his own country. In the German 
bookstores the critical writings of Strauss and the 
theological writings of Tom Paine stand on the same 
shelf, and are apparently held in equal honor. Why 
should it not be so with us? In what respect is 
Strauss so much better than Paine, that he should be 
respected while Paine is despised ? If he has more 
learning and more decency than Paine, he certainly 
has much less of sound, practical common sense. And 
we are sorry to be obliged to add, that much of what 
De Wette has said about the Old Testament (made 
current among us by Theodore Parker's translations) 
is very little better than what Strauss says about the 
New. Since the blazing celebrity of Renan has thrown 
its glare over the world, Strauss has entirely re-written 
his life of Jesus, but with no essential improvement. 

(2) HYPOTHESIS OF WEISSE. 

Chr. Herm. Weisse is an older man than Strauss, a 
philosopher of no mean pretensions, and a metaphysi- 
cian. He had published a work on the Fundamental 
Principles of Metaphysics, another on the Idea of God, 
a System of Aesthetics, etc. ; and in 1838, awakened 
by the celebrity of Strauss, he published a book enti- 



SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HIST. 275 

tied the Gospel History critically and philosophically 
investigated (bearbeitet, belabored). Weisse understands 
animal magnetism, and all the mysteries of clairvoy- 
ance. 

(a) The facts out of ivhich the Gospel narratives 
have arisen. There lived in Palestine during the reign 
of Tiberias a good man, one Jesus of Nazareth, who 
among other happy gifts, possessed the magnetic power 
of healing. He was in fact a full charged galvanic 
battery, ready at any touch to be discharged. He 
went about Galilee preaching, collecting disciples, and 
applying his magnetic power to the healing of diseases 
and the quieting of demoniacs ; so that he very natu- 
rally gained the affections of the Galileans, who recog- 
nized in him the Messiah, and would have been glad 
to make him king. But, though he felt his Messiah- 
ship, he had no political ambition, and sought rather 
the moral elevation of the people ; and in prosecution 
of this purpose he uttered many parables. Thus he 
represented the blessed effects of his ministry under 
the image of the opening of the heavens and the de- 
scent of a dove ; the strong faith which men should 
exercise in the grace of God, by the parable of a Ca- 
naanitish woman seeking help of a Jew, and taking 
no denial ; the judgment which is to come upon men 
spiritually unfruitful, by the image of a barren fig-tree 
cursed and withered ; the regeneration of the world 
by his word he compares to turning water into wine, 
etc., He once occasioned great excitement by awak- 
ening a maiden who had fallen into a swoon and was 
supposed to be dead. He never went to Jerusalem 
but once, and that was at the feast of the passover, 



276 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE, 

when he was immediately apprehended and crucified. 
We have no reason to believe that he prayed aloud 
the night before his apprehension ; or that he said 
when they were nailing him to the cross, Father, for- 
give them, for they know not ivhat they do. During his 
crucifixion there was an accidental obscurity of the 
heavens which made much talk. He was buried, and 
his body remained in the tomb ; but his nervo-magnetic 
spirit once appeared to his disciples and passed up into 
the clouds. 

(b) Origin of the miraculous stories. These all 
came very naturally. After the death of Jesus his 
parables were turned into stories, and men thought 
they were actual occurrences. (How many times has 
this happened in respect to ^Esop's fables!) These 
stories were not propagated by the apostles ; they 
busied themselves only with teaching the doctrines of 
their Master, and said nothing about his biography. 
But somebody told the stories and found people to 
believe them ; and other stories were made from very 
trivial circumstances. From what he once casually 
said, that he whose feet are tuashed is every whit clean, 
arose the story of his having washed his disciples' 
feet ; the apostles practised baptism, and after a while 
began to think (Weisse does not tell us why) that Je- 
sus had instituted such a rite. Once, after Jesus' 
death, when the apostles were at supper together, they 
became greatly excited with the idea of prosecuting 
the work which he had left unfinished ; and this gave 
rise to the story that Christ himself had instituted the 
Lord's Supper; and also to the tradition, so much 
like the theophanies of Homer, of his supping with 
the two disciples at Emmaus after his crucifixion. 



SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HIST. 277 

(c) Origin of the ivritten Gospels. According to 
the testimony of Papias, (says Weisse,) the apostle 
Matthew wrote in the Hebrew of that time, a collec- 
tion of the discourses of Jesus. According to the 
same authority, Mark, a scholar of Peter, wrote a biog- 
raphy of Jesus, as he had heard Peter relate it ; and 
afterwards this narrative of Mark was combined with 
Matthew's collection of discourses, (now translated 
into Greek,) and this compilation is our present Greek 
Gospel of Matthew. Meanwhile, Luke, the companion 
of Paul, had written another biography from inde- 
pendent sources. Here we have the first three Gos- 
pels. As to the fourth Gospel, ascribed to John, it 
was not originally intended for a biography at all ; but 
the apostle John, when he was a very old man, con- 
tinually pondering over his ideal of the life of Christ, 
(now growing very dim and shadowy,) that he might 
not lose entirely this image out of his mind, wrote 
down fragmentary notices, as they happened to occur 
to him, without any view to publication, and not even 
intending any real objective biography, but merely for 
the purpose of defining and fixing his own subjective 
ideal. But, after the good apostle's death, some un- 
lucky elders found these fragments in his study, and im- 
agining they were written as an actual memoir of Jesus, 
arranged them for publication, and gave them to the 
world, with such modifications, additions, and connect- 
ing sentences, as the exigencies of the case seemed to 
require. Thus we have our present Gospel of John. 

(d) Estimate of this hypothesis. The reader must 
understand that Weisse does not even pretend to 
have any testimony as to the facts being as he states 



278 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

them. He would think it unworthy of a philosopher 
like him to come at a historical result in that way. It 
is but a specimen of the developing of history from 
internal consciousness, instead of learning it from ex- 
ternal evidence. To illustrate the safety and accuracy 
of this method of developing historical facts, let us try 
it in reference to some book of American biography. 
Marshall's Life of Washington, as we now have it, was 
not written by Judge Marshall, except detached por- 
tions of it, nor has the book been seen in the United 
States, till within a few months past. The origin of 
the work was this : During the nullification excitement 
of 1827, Hon. John Holmes of Maine amused himself 
by writing notes across the Senate Chamber, to Hon. 
T. H. Benton of Missouri. Mr. Benton preserved these 
notes, thinking he might sometime have occasion for 
them, and he added some of his own. At the session 
of Congress during Mr. Clay's compromise efforts, Mr. 
B., perceiving that his time had come, committed these 
papers to Hon. Amos Kendall, who, out of them and 
Judge Marshall's papers, forged the book called Mar- 
shall's Life of Washington. In consequence of this 
publication, Col. Benton was elected president of the 
United States, and Gen. Cass, amid much noise and 
confusion, migrated to California ! This, if not exactly 
like the Hegelian hypotheses of Scripture history, is 
just as good and just as true as the most of them. 

(3) HYPOTHESIS OF GFROERER. 

Aug. Gfroerer is a countryman of Strauss, and a wri- 
ter of reputation. His church history especially (pub- 
lished in 1841-45) is spoken of by competent judges 



SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HIST. 279 

as a work of great merit. He began (as he says) to 
meditate his theories earlier than Strauss, but they are 
no better, and if possible, in some respects even worse. 
The Gospel of John he considers genuine, but the 
other three, spurious and mythical. A few miracles, 
such as the healing of the nobleman's son and the sick 
man of Bethema, he admits, and does not sympathize 
with Strauss in his rejection of all miraculous narratives. 
The three synoptical Gospels (Matthew, Mark and 
Luke), according to him, owe their origin to the influ- 
ence of the writings of Philo and other Jews ; and 
many ideas in them are derived directly from the Tal- 
mud, the Fourth Book of Esdras, the Book of Enoch, 
and other apocryphal writings. (The thing counter- 
feited owes its existence to the counterfeit.) He is at 
much pains to prove the antiquity of these apocryphal 
and Talmudic writings, to make them, if possible, seem 
older than the Gospels, but with very indifferent suc- 
cess. Even granting him the antiquity he claims, the 
resemblances on which here lies for the support of his 
theory are marvelously unlike, as if one should derive 
the wigs of the English bishops and judges from the 
head-dress of the Feejee islanders. 

To cite a few examples : According to ^e J erusalem 
Talmud, one day when Rabbi Eliezer and Rabbi Jona- 
than were riding together, the former began to dis- 
course, when the latter hastily dismounted from his 
ass, and said : " It is not reasonable that I should bear 
the honor of my Creator, and thereby ride on an ass." 
They both sat down under a tree, and there fell fire 
from heaven and surrounded them (as a reward of 
their humility). From this and other similar passages, 



280 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Gfroerer concludes that in the time of Christ the Jews 
held fire to be a necessary accompaniment of revela- 
tions from God. Hence arose the tradition that John 
Baptist had declared that Jesus should baptize with 
fire ! In the same Talmud it is related that Deuteron- 
omy came to God and said : " Lord, thou hast writ- 
ten down thy law in me ; " and then complained that 
Solomon, when he took to himself many wives, took 
away the jod or y out of the word nshym, Deut. xvii. 
17. Then God answered Deuteronomy and said : u Sol- 
omon and a thousand like him shall perish ; but not a 
vowel shall perish from thee." Hence arose the tra- 
dition that Jesus had said, that not one jot or one tittle 
of the law should fail. The Targum of Jonathan, in 
Zech. xiv. 21, translates the word Canaanite by mer- 
chant; hence the tradition that Christ drove the 
money-changers out of the temple! These deriva- 
tions certainly exceed Knickerbocker's etymology of 
the word mango from the name Jeremiah King ; for in 
this case the steps are quite obvious, thus : Jeremiah 
King^ Jerry King, Jerkin, Cucumber, Mango. 

The doctrine of the Trinity, Gfroerer thinks is of 
Rabbinic origin. The text, Zech. xiv. 4, the predicted 
disruption of the Mount of Olives, is explained of the 
Messiah and his sister the Holy Ghost, who are both, 
according to the Rabbins, ninety-six miles high and 
twenty-four miles wide. Hence comes the whole Chris- 
tian doctrine of the Trinity! 0, Gfroerer, thou art 
beside thyself / much learning hath made thee mad. 

Ebrard, in the first edition of his work, with great 
significancy certainly, if not with scrupulous delicacy, 
illustrates the probability of Gfroerer's hypothesis of 



SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HIST. 281 

the origin of the Gospels, by the following figure : A 
company of "leprous beggars wash themselves in a 
river, and from this river a beautiful young man is seen 
to emerge ; the inference is certain that this young 
man was made from the impurities which the beggars 
had washed off. And what in this case is the more 
remarkable, the young man came to the shore before 
the beggars had been in the water at all ! 

(4) HYPOTHESIS OF BRUNO BAUER. 

Bruno Bauer is a younger man than Strauss, and he 
may well be regarded as the extreme extremity of the 
extreme left wing of Hegelianism. In him self-deifi- 
cation and the annihilation of all objective truth have 
reached their culminating point. No subtilty or re- 
finement or locomotive force of Hegelianism can ever 
go beyond Bruno Bauer. His thoughts are so misty, 
and his expressions so bombastic and overstrained, 
that it is exceedingly difficult to get his meaning, and 
still more difficult to give a translation of it in another 
language ; for like very tenuous gasses, it all seems to 
evaporate as soon as. it meets the air. It is, however, 
sufficiently plain that Bruno has a very high opinion 
of himself, a very low opinion of all theologians, and 
of God no opinion at all. At the very outset he anni- 
hilates all historical truth. There was indeed a Jesus, 
and there was a community in the Jewish nation which 
formed the nucleus of the Christian church ; and this 
is nearly the whole of the historical basis which he is 
disposed to acknowledge. - There were no Messianic 
prophecies or expectations among the Jews, there was 
no baptism of Jesus, there were no discourses, no mir- 



282 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

acles, not anything to give an objective foundation to 
the historical narratives in the Gospels. These narra- 
tives are not records of facts which once actually oc- 
curred ; but they are the spontaneous efflorescence of 
the innermost religious consciousness of the age. The 
writers did not even profess to themselves to record 
facts, nor did they pretend to make other people think 
they were recording facts. How it is that men could 
write long narratives without thinking they were facts 
and without intending to write fiction, Bauer himself 
explains in a way of his own. We will translate his 
language as well as we are able, and leave the reader 
to guess his meaning. Says Bauer : " The religious 
spirit is that disruption of the self-consciousness, in 
which the essential definiteness of the same steps over 
against the consciousness as a power separate from it. 
Before this power the self-consciousness must naturally 
lose itself; for it has therein cast out its own contents, 
out of itself, and so far as it can still sustain itself as a 
Me for itself, it feels itself before that power as nothing, 
so as it must regard the same as the nothing of its own 
self. Nevertheless the Me as self-consciousness can- 
not entirely lose itself — in its subjective, secular 
thought filled with moral ends and its willing, it still 
maintains its freedom ; and into this freedom also the 
religious consciousness and the historical development 
of the same are involuntarily drawn. Both the reli- 
gious consciousness and free self-consciousness thus 
come into contact, to interpenetration, without which 
the first could be neither individually living nor capa- 
ble of a historical growth. But so as this livingness 
and growth, after their first contact, become the sub- 



SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HIST. 283 

ject of religious reflection, they are again torn from 
the self-consciousness, they step before the conscious- 
ness as the deed of another, and now also, necessarily, 
the interposition which had placed them in the self- 
consciousness as its own movement, becomes a ma- 
chinery whose bands are guided in another world. 1 ' 
{Kritik der evang. Geschichle der Synoptiker, i. 25 f.) 
Such is his explanation of this wonderful phenomenon, 
and doubtless it is to himself very profound and satis- 
factory. 

These principles being settled, the origin of the first 
three Gospels, according to Bruno, was as follows: 
Somebody wrote the book which bears the name of 
Mark, and others very strangely mistook it for a verit- 
able biography of Jesus. Another afterwards took 
this book in hand, and without thinking it was not his- 
torical, changed and modified it according to his own 
ideas, and thus we have the Gospel of Luke. Now 
comes a third, and compares these two writings to- 
gether, seeks to reconcile the contradictions he finds, 
compiles and combines, reading first a verse in one 
and then a verse in the other. In this writer's reflec- 
tion, subjectivity predominates ; yet he, as well as his 
predecessors, is all unaware, that what he writes is 
simply the product of his own imagination, and not 
real, objective history. Here we have the Gospel of 
Matthew. 

This Bruno is very confident, and feels great con- 
tempt for theologians. He says: "See how they 
(the theologians) stand there ; how the theological 
hate glows from their eyes. Ha! would you grasp 
the thunder ? Miserable mortals ! well that it was not 



284 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

given to 7011! " "Now, after the above exploitations, 
ask them whether they really think their Jesuitism 
can hold on ; whether they believe that their decep- 
tion and lying will endure forever ? When the time 
comes that their falsehood must be a conscious and de- 
termined lie, then their judgment is no longer far off." 

HYPOTHESIS OF BE NAN. 

The Vie de Jesus (Life of Jesus) by Ernest Renan, 
published in Paris some two years since, has become 
well known. It differs from the German works to 
which we have been attending as a Frenchman gener- 
ally differs from a German. It is lively and popular 
in style but pre-eminently superficial and untrustwor- 
thy. It is not nearly so much a biography of Jesus as 
Daniel Defoe's History of the Devil is a biography of 
Satan. 

Before expressing my own opinion of the work of 
Renan, I will give an estimate of it by a learned Prus- 
sian Jew, Dr. Philippson of Magdeburg. Dr. Philippson 
as a Jewish Rabbi is as much averse to admitting the his- 
torical credibility of the Gospels as Renan himself, but 
his solid Teutonic erudition is repelled and disgusted by 
the flippant shallowness of the Frenchman. He says : 
" The author who after Strauss has gained the greatest 
renown in literature of this kind is the Frenchman 
Ernest Renan (Vie de Jesus, cinquieme edition, Paris, 
1863), but for our subject he is of no value. Renan 
is no critic ; he is merely a rationalist." 

" With the aid of lively colors, or psychological rai- 
sonnements, he, as a master of his language, produces 
a very readable biography. It was natural, therefore, 



SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HIST. 285 

that his work found many readers, especially, in France, 
and was met with violent refutation on the part of the 
clergy ; but it could gain no great importance in the 
domain of science and historical criticism, for after all, 
much of the work rests upon arbitrary assumptions — 
very little upon critical principles and an examination 
corresponding with them." 

" He often contradicts himself most glaringly, even 
now and then on the same page of his book." 

"Meeting with such a confusion of ideas and such 
a misconception of all history, we may dispense with 
all further examination. We said so much lest we 
should be charged with an omission."* 

A very brief exposition of the style of thought and 
the general tone of Renan's celebrated work, will, I 
think, satisfy every intelligent reader that the truly 
learned Jewish Rabbi whom we have just quoted, has 
given a fair and accurate estimate of his real merits as 
a writer on the Gospels. 

In making out the following analysis we avail our- 
selves of an able article in the London Reader. 

His Family and Native Place. He came from the 
ranks of the people. His father Joseph, and his mother 
Mary, were persons of middling condition, belonging 
to the class of artizans living by their labor, in that 
state, common in the East, which is neither one of easy 
circumstances nor of misery. . . . If we set aside 
something of the sordid and the repulsive which Islam- 
ism everywhere carries with it, the town of Nazareth, 
in the time of Jesus, did not differ much, perhaps, from 

*Dr. Philippson on the "Crucifixion and the Jews," translated from 
the Allgemeine Zeitung des Judenthums, by M. Mayer. 



286 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

what it is at present. The streets where he played as a 
child, we see them still in those stony paths or those 
small crossways which separate the huts. The house 
of Joseph much resembled, doubtless, those poor shops, 
lighted by the door, serving at once as working-booth, 
kitchen, and bed-chamber, and having for their furni- 
ture a mat, some cushions on the ground, one or two 
clay vessels, and a painted chest. The family, proceed- 
ing from one or more marriages, was numerous enough. 
Jesus had brothers and sisters, of whom he seems to 
have been the eldest. All the others remain obscure ; 
for it appears that the four persons represented as his 
brothers, and of whom at least one, James, became of 
great importance in the first years of the development 
of Christianity, were his cousins-german. Mary, in 
fact, had a sister, named also Mary, who married a cer- 
tain Alpheus or Cleophas (these two names seem to 
designate one person), and was the mother of several 
sons, who played a considerable part among the first 
disciples of Jesus. These cousins-german, who ad- 
hered to the young master while his true brothers op- 
posed him, took the name of "brothers of the Lord." 
The true brothers of Jesus were, as well as their 
mother, of no importance till after his death. . . . 
His sisters married at Nazareth, and there he passed 
the years of his first youth. Nazareth was a small 
town . . . the population at present is from three 
to four thousand souls ; and it can not have changed 
much. The cold there is keen in winter, and the cli- 
mate very healthy. The town, as at that epoch all 
the smaller Jewish towns, was a collection of huts built 
without style, and must have presented the dry and 



SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HIST. 287 

poor aspect which villages in the Semitic countries 
still offer. The houses, as far as appears, did not differ 
much from those cubes of stone, without elegance 
either exterior or interior, which now cover the richer 
parts of the Libanus, and which, mingled with vines 
and fig-trees, have still a very agreeable look. The 
surrounding country, on the other hand, is charming ; 
and no spot in the world was so fitted for dreams of 
absolute happiness. Even in our days Nazareth is still 
a delicious place of residence — the only spot, perhaps, 
in Palestine, where the soul feels itself somewhat re- 
lieved from the burden which oppresses it in the midst 
of desolation unequalled. The people are amiable 
and cheerful ; the gardens are fresh and green. An- 
toninus Martyr, at the end of the sixth century, drew 
an enchanting picture of the fertility of the, country 
round, comparing it to Paradise. Some valleys on the 
western side fully justify his description. The foun- 
tain, round which were gathered the life and gayety 
of the small town, is destroyed ; its choked-up chan- 
nels give now only turbid water. But the beauty of 
the women who meet there in the evening — that 
beauty which was already marked in the sixth century, 
and in which people saw a gift of the Virgin Mary — 
is preserved in a striking manner. It is the Syrian 
type, in all its grace, so full of languor. Doubtless, 
Mary was there almost every day, and took her place, 
the urn on her shoulder, in the string of her fellow- 
countrywomen who have left no name. Antoninus 
Martyr remarked that the Jewish women, elsewhere 
disdainful to Christians, are here full of affability. 
Even to the present day religious animosities are less 
keen at Nazareth than elsewhere. 



288 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

His Youth and Education. He learned to read and 
write, doubtless according to the method of the East, 
which consists in placing in the child's hands a book, 
which he repeats in cadence with his little comrades 
until he knows it by heart. It is doubtful, however, 
whether he knew well the Hebrew Scriptures in their 
original tongue. His biographers make him quote 
them from the Aramean translations. . . . The 
school-master in the small Jewish towns was the Haz- 
an or reader in the synagogues. Jesus frequented 
little the higher schools of the scribes, or Soferim 
(Nazareth, perhaps, had not one of them) ; and he had 
none of those titles which confer, in vulgar eyes, the 
rights of knowledge. It would, nevertheless, be a great 
error to imagine that Jesus was what we should now 
call uneducated. . . It is not probable that he had 
learned Greek, That language was little spread in 
Judea beyond the classes which shared in the govern- 
ment, and the towns inhabited by pagans, like Cesarsea. 
The idiom proper to Jesus was the Syriac dialect, 
mixed with Hebrew, then spoken in Palestine. . . . 
Neither directly nor indirectly did any element of Hel- 
lenic culture reach Jesus. He knew nothing beyond 
Judaism ; his mind preserved that frank naivete which 
an extended and varied culture always enfeebles. 
Nay, within the bosom of Judaism, he remained a 
stranger to many efforts that had been made, often 
parallel to his own. On the one hand, the asceticism 
of the Essenians or Therapeutse, on the other, the fine 
essays of religious philosophy made by the Jewish 
school of Alexandria, and of which his contemporary 
Philo was the ingenious interpreter, were unknown to 



SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HIST. 289 

him. . . . Happily for him he knew nothing of 
the strange scholasticism which was being taught at Je- 
rusalem, and which was ultimately to form the Talmud. 
If some Pharisees had already brought it into Galilee, 
he did not attend to them ; and, when, afterwards, he 
came in contact with this silly casuistry, it inspired 
him only with disgust. One may suppose, neverthe- 
less, that the principles of Hillel were not unknown to 
him. Hillel, fifty years before him, had uttered apho- 
risms which had much analogy to his own. By his 
poverty humbly endured, by the sweetness of his char- 
acter, by his opposition to hypocrites and to priests, 
Hillel was the true master of Jesus, if it is lawful to 
talk of a master when one is concerned with so high 
an originality. . . . The reading of the Old Tes- 
tament made far more impression upon him. . . . 
The law appears not to have had much charm for him. 
He believed that a better could be made. But the 
religious poetry of the Psalms was in wonderful accord 
with his lyrical soul ; they remained, all his life, his 
food and sustenance. The prophets, in particular 
Isaiah and his continuator of the time of the Captivity, 
were, with their brilliant dreams of the future, their im- 
petuous eloquence, their invectives mingled with en : 
chanting pictures, his true masters. He read, doubtless,' 
also, some of the apocryphal works — that is to say, J 8f 
those writings sufficiently modern, the authors_6flwhicti:, ; 
in order to give themselves an authority more j willing5^ 
allowed to the very ancient writings, ;) sheKeredr j th^ffi 
selves under the names of prophets 'Uhd_patriarcM 
One of these books above allf struck him;°it f; wa ) s tfie 
Book of Daniel. . . V n ^e 1 tmi^ft xr bn^r8ctfef^ 
19 



290 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

part revealed itself. The legends delight in showing 
him. from his childhood, revolting against paternal 
authority, and walking from common paths in order 
to follow his calling. It is certain, at least, that the 
relations of kindred were to him of small concern. 
His family do not seem to have liked him ; and, at 
times, he is found hard towards them. Jesus, like all 
men exclusively preoccupied by an idea, came to regard 
the ties of blood as of small account. 

Galilee and Southern Judea. Every people called 
to high destinies ought to be a small complete world, 
enclosing opposed poles within its bosom. Greece 
had, at a few leagues from each other, Sparta and 
Athens, two antipodes to a superficial observer, but in 
reality rival sisters, necessary the one to the other. It 
was the same with Judea. Less brilliant in one sense 
than the development of Jerusalem, that of the north 
was on the whole much more fruitful ; the most living 
performances of the Jewish people always came thence. 
A complete absence of the sentiment of nature, bor- 
dering somewhat on the dry, the narrow, the sullen, 
struck all works of purely Hierosolymite origin with a 
character grandiose indeed, but sad and repulsive. 
With her solemn doctors, her insipid canonists, her 
hypocritical and atrabilious devotees, Jerusalem could 
not have conquered humanity. . . . The north 
alone produced Christianity; Jerusalem, on the con- 
trary, is the true native country of the obstinate Juda- 
ism which, founded by the Pharisees and fixed by the 
Talmud, has traversed the Middle Ages and reached 
jur own days. A ravishing natural scenery contri- 
buted to form this spirit, much less austere, less fiercely 



SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HIST. 291 

monotheistic, if I may so say, which impressed upon 
all the dreams of the Galilean mind something idyllic 
and charming. The saddest country in the world is, 
perhaps, the region near Jerusalem. Galilee, on the 
other hand, is a land very green, very shady, smiling 
all over — the true land of the Song of Songs and of 
the chants of the Well-beloved. During the two 
months of March and April the champaign is a dense 
thicket of flowers of incomparable freshness and col- 
ors. The animals there are small, but of extreme do- 
cility. . . . In no country in the world do the 
mountains lay themselves out with more harmony or 
inspire higher thoughts. Jesus seems to have particu- 
larly loved them. The most important acts of his 
divine career took place on the mountains ; there was 
he best inspired ; it was there that he held secret com- 
munion with the ancient prophets, and that he showed 
himself to the eyes of disciples already transfigured. 
. . . Jesus lived and grew up in this intoxicating 
medium ; but, from his infancy, he made almost annu- 
ally the journey to Jerusalem for the festival. 

The Theology of Jesus. A high notion of Deity, 
which he did not owe to Judaism, and which seems to 
have been in all its parts the creation of his own great 
soul, was, in a manner, the principle of his whole 
power. . . . The highest consciousness of Deity 
that has ever existed in the breast of humanity was 
that of Jesus. One sees, on the other hand, that Jesus, 
starting from such a disposition of soul as his, never 
could have been a speculative philosopher like Cakya- 
Mouni. Nothing is farther from scholastic theology 
than the Gospel. The speculations of the Greek 



292 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

fathers on the divine essence came from quite another 
spirit. God conceived immediately as Father — this is 
all the theology of Jesus. . . . It is probable that, 
from the first, he regarded himself as being to God in 
the relation of a son to his father. Here is his great 
act of originality ; in this he is not like one of his race. 
Neither Jew nor Mussulman has understood this deli- 
cious theology of love. The God of Jesus is not that 
fatal master who kills us when he pleases, condemns 
us when he pleases, saves us when he pleases. The 
God of Jesus is Our Father. 

Matured Notion of his Mission. This name "King- 
dom of God," or "Kingdom of Heaven," was the fa- 
vorite term with Jesus for expressing the revolution 
which he brought into the world. Like almost all the 
other Messianic terms, it came from the Book of Dan- 
iel. According to the author of that extraordinary 
book, to the four profane kingdoms, destined to sink, 
a fifth empire was to succeed, which should be that of 
the Saints, and should endure forever. This kingdom 
of God upon the earth had naturally received diverse 
interpretations. . . . All that Jesus owed to John 
was, to some extent, lessons in preaching and popular 
action. From that moment, in fact, he preached with 
much more force, and imposed himself on the crowd 
with authority. It seems, also, that his sojourn near 
John, less by the action of the Baptist than by the 
natural progress of his own thoughts, greatly matured 
his ideas respecting the "Kingdom of Heaven." His 
watchword thenceforward was "Good tidings"- — news 
that the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand. Jesus will 
no longer be merely a delightful moralist, aspiring to 



SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HIST. 293 

enclose sublime lessons in some loving and brief aphor- 
ism ; he is the transcendant revolutionist who strives 
to renew the world from its foundations, and to found 
on earth the ideal which he has conceived. To " wait 
for the Kingdom of God " will be the synonym for 
being a disciple of Jesus. . . . Who is to estab- 
lish this Kingdom of God ? Let us remember that the 
first thought of Jesus — a thought so profound with 
him that it had probably no origin, but belonged to 
the very roots of his being — was that he was the Son 
of God, the intimate of his Father, the doer of his 
will ; and then the answer of Jesus to such a question 
will not be doubtful. The conviction that he would 
cause God to reign possessed itself of his spirit in a 
manner quite absolute. He considered himself as the 
universal reformer. Heaven, earth, all nature, mad- 
ness, malady, and death are but his instruments. In 
his access of heroic will he believes himself all-power- 
ful. If the Earth is not ready for this last transforma- 
tion, the Earth will be burnt, purified by fire and the 
breath of God. A new Heaven will be created, and 
the whole world will be peopled with the angels of 
God. A radical revolution, embracing even physical 
nature itself — such was the fundamental thought of 
Jesus. 

Inadequate Modern Appreciation of great Characters 
and Movements. Our principles of positive science are 
hurt by the dreams which the plan of Jesus embraced. 
We know the history of the earth ; cosmical revolu- 
tions of the kind which Jesus expected are produced 
only by geological or astronomical causes, the connec- 
tion of which with moral matters has never been 



294 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

ascertained. But, to be just to great creative minds, 
it is necessary not to stop at the prejudices they may 
have shared with their time. . . . The deism of 
the eighteenth century and a certain kind of protest- 
antism have accustomed us to consider the founder of 
the Christian faith only as a great moralist, a benefac- 
tor of humanity. We see in the Gospel only good 
maxims; we throw a prudent veil over the strange 
intellectual state in which it was born. There are 
people, also, who regret that the French Revolution 
went more than once out of the track of principles, 
and was not the work of wise and moderate men. 
Let us not impose our small plans of middle-class good 
sense upon those extraordinary movements so greatly 
beyond our stature. Let us continue to admire the 
"morality of the Gospel " — let us suppress in our reli- 
gious instructions the chimera that was the soul of it ; 
but let us not believe that, by simple ideas of good- 
ness or individual morality, the world is ever stirred. 
The idea of Jesus was much more profound ; it was 
the most revolutionary idea that was ever conceived 
in a human brain ; it must be taken in its totality, and 
not with those timid suppressions which retrench from 
it precisely that which made it effective for the regen- 
eration of humanity. Fundamentally, the ideal is 
always a Utopia. When we wish at present to repre- 
sent the Christ of modern consciousness, the consoler, 
the judge of these new times, what do we do? That 
which Jesus himself did 1830 years ago. We suppose 
the conditions of the real world altogether other than 
they are ; we represent a moral deliverer breaking, 
without arms, the chains of the negro, ameliorating 



SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HIST. 295 

the condition of the poor, freeing the oppressed nations. 
We forget that this supposes a world turned upside- 
down, the climate of Virginia and that of Congo modi- 
fied, the blood and race of millions of men changed, 
our social complications brought back to a chimerical 
simplicity, the political stratifications of Europe tilted 
out of their order." 

What is all this but the sheerest and most extrava- 
gant moonshine ? What shadow or even pretence of a 
shadow of historical testimony or historical evidence 
of any kind does Renan give us ? Not a particle of 
evidence of any kind, except the vagaries of his own 
brain, does he pretend to give. Strauss, Renan, and 
all the rest simply start with the principle that a mira- 
cle is impossible, and then any hypothesis to ac- 
count for the existence of Christianity, however wild, 
absurd and self-contradictory it may be, is more rational 
than the belief in its miraculous origin so simply and 
so clearly stated in our sacred books. 

Compare the following passages : (1) " So long as 
the Gospels are regarded as historical sources, in the 
strict sense of the word, so long a historical view of 
the life of Jesus is impossible. 1 ' (Strauss p. 40.) For 
" historical enquiry refuses absolutely to recognize any- 
where any such thing " as a miracle (p. 146). (2) " In 
the person and work of Jesus nothing supernatural 
happened ; ... for thus much we can soon dis- 
cover about our Gospels, that neither all nor any of 
them display such historical trustworthiness as to com- 
pel our reason to the acceptance of a miracle " (p. 15). 

Similarly M. Renan : (1) " The first twelve chap- 
ters of Acts are a tissue of miracles. Now, an absolute 



296 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

rule of criticism is, to allow no place in historical nar- 
ration to miracles " (p. 43). (2) " Show me a speci- 
men of these things, and I will admit them. 
The onus probancU in science rests with those who 
allege a fact." (p. 45.) 

HYPOTHESIS OF SCHENKEL. 

Prof. Daniel Schenkel is probably the highest au- 
thority among the German rationalists of the present 
generation ; and his is the most recent effort at con- 
structing the life of Jesus out of one's own inward con- 
sciousness, without reference or rather in direct opposi- 
tion to the historical testimony on the subject.* 

From his own inward consciousness and without any 
external testimony, he thinks himself competent to 
correct the Gospel narrative as follows: "Jesus was 
born at Nazareth, not at Bethlehem. He was not in 
the wilderness all the time of the temptation, nor did 
he abstain from food. He made no journey to Jerusa- 
lem but the last, which terminated in his death. John 
the Baptist did not recognize Jesus' Messiahship, nor 
testify of him, nor urge any disciples to follow him. 
Jesus could not possibly have said that not one jot or 
tittle of the Old Testament would pass away. He 
could not have referred to his resurrection before his 
death, for he was not raised, and if he had been, he 
could not have known it beforehand. u 0f a suffering 
Messiah the Old Testament knows nothing." 

* The character of Jesus portrayed. A Biblical Essay with an 
Appendix. By Dr. Daniel Schenkel, Professor of Theology, Heidel- 
berg. Translated from the third German edition, with introduction 
and notes, by W. II. Furness, D. D. Boston : Little, Brown & Co. 



SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HIST. 297 

Of the writers of the four Gospels u Mark he thinks 
the most accurate of all, though many things have 
been added by another hand, which are not trustwor- 
thy. Matthew was written by a Jewish disciple, and, 
as it attempts to prove that the prophecies of a Jewish 
Messiah found fulnillment in Jesus, much of it must be 
rejected. Luke adds many incidents and parables to 
adapt the new religion to the Gentile world, and these 
must be carefully winnowed. Little reliance can be 
placed on John's Gospel, for it contradicts the histor- 
ical order, by making Jesus have a distinct conception 
of his work from the beginning. This accords, indeed, 
with Old Testament teaching, and with the plan of 
God as revealed, but it can not have a place in Dr. 
Schenkel's historical theory, and must be rejected." 

" Now one naturally imagines, from such statements, 
that Dr. Schenkel must doubt the veracity of the Gos- 
pel writers. It would seem as if there were but two 
alternatives in the case ; either they told the simple 
truth, which they claim to have known, and to whose 
veracity they bore witness by suffering and death ; or else 
they invented the whole or a part to deceive the world. 
But his theory is strangely elastic, and saves their credit 
while it denies their statements." He says : 

" It is no device of writers aiming to establish a point, 
still less, as from a low historical point of view it may 
be thought, is it falsehood and deceit that we have 
here. In these extraordinary accounts we have the 
unconscious homage of a religiously inspired imagina- 
tion paid to Jesus by disciples and friends."* 

I can not see that Dr. Schenkel has improved at all 

* Christian Watchman and Reflector. 



298 THE BOOKS 01 THE BIBLE. 

upon Strauss, or that he is really any more reliable 
than Kenan. All these hypotheses are utterly baseless, 
they have not a foot to stand upon, they are con- 
structed not only without historical testimony, but in 
direct opposition to all the historical testimony we ac- 
tually possess on the subject. They are simply the 
outgrowth of the fancy and the imagination of the 
writers. They are in fact the Apocryphal Gospels of 
the nineteenth century, in every respect as apocry- 
phal as those compositions of the fourth, fifth and sixth 
centuries which have already passed under review, 
only adapted to the faithlessness of this generation as 
those were to the superstitious credulity of the times 
in which they originated. 

HYPOTHESIS OF F. C. BAUR. 

It is generally admitted by these theorizers that 
there was no intentional deception on the part of the 
writers of our Gospels. Though there is very little, 
if any historical truth in their compositions, yet their 
intentions were good ; a religious imagination, a harm- 
less enthusiasm, an amiable fanaticism guided their 
pens. F. C. Baur, the founder and the most brilliant 
representative of the famous Tuebingen school, takes 
a somewhat different view. The Gospels were orig- 
inally written for the express purpose of deception, 
for the express purpose of sustaining the theology of 
Paul against that of Peter, or the theology of Peter 
against that of Paul. Of course there is no historical 
testimony to that effect, he does not even pretend to 
any ; he makes his conclusion from internal evidence 
alone ; yet, strange to say, these writings have been 



SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HIST. 299 

so modified and smoothed over since their original pro- 
duction, that all traces of this controversial tendency 
have pretty much disappeared from the pages. The 
following statements are from an elaborate article in 
the London Quarterly Review : 

"According to Baur, each of the Gospels had a ten- 
dency—was written for a purpose. There was, he 
alleges, a much more active feud between two oppo- 
site elements in the early church — between the Ebion- 
itish or Petrine element and the Pauline — than would 
be gathered from the New Testament itself. This 
controversy began from the time of the apostles and 
did not end until the middle of the second century. 
It was a contest between those who viewed Christianity 
as Judaism and the Lord as the Messiah, and those who 
viewed it as a new principle by which both Judaism 
and heathenism were to be moulded and transformed 
into a new system. Of the former opinion Peter was 
the chief champion; the supersedure of temple and 
law in favor of Christianity, an all-embracing system, 
was the work of Paul. But the contest, says Baur, 
was much more obstinate and lasting than we should 
infer from the Acts of the Apostles. The life of Paul 
was passed in the struggle for recognition as one of 
the apostles, for perfect equality of Jew and Gentile 
converts, for emancipation from the law. But the dis- 
pute continued far beyond his life, and all the early 
church literature is to be interpreted by the light of 
this dispute. The books of the New Testament are 
either party- writings on one side or the other, or else 
they are later productions, intended to conciliate and 
conceal this difference, and to unite all Christians upon 



300 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

one common ground. And most of the books are of 
this latter class, and it follows, that they are not the 
genuine productions of those whose names they bear. 
The lateness of St. Mark's G-ospel is inferred from the 
absence of controversial matter and other reasons. 
St. Luke's Gospel had originally a strong Pauline and 
an ti- Jewish tendency ; but in the later edition of it, 
which we possess, this tendency was much modified 
and softened ! St. Matthew must likewise have been 
modified, the original Gospel being very different from 
that which we now possess, more decidedly Judaic in 
'tendency,' whilst the Greek Gospel as we possess it 
has the general character of the other two Gospels, 
one of conciliation between the two great parties ! 

The critical power that can discover a strong Gen- 
tile prejudice in a narrative, after some one has gone 
over it with the express purpose of taking out all signs 
of this, does not belong to the region of science but 
of second sight. If ever there were books free from 
all taint of prejudice, from the stifling heat of contro- 
versy, the four Gospels are these books. If it had 
been reserved for this century to disclose a hidden pur- 
pose and bias in the writers, the grounds on which it 
rests should surely be accessible to us all. We can 
conceive that eyes long exercised in the twilight of 
antiquity may catch forms and shades that escape our 
own ; but eyes that read not only what is there, but 
what would have been there if it had not been taken 
out, are beyond the reach even of imagination." 

It is scarcely necessary to give any specimens of 
Schwegler, Keim, Yolkmar, and other critics of the 
Tuphino-pn school. Though differing somewhat from 



SUBSTITUTES FOR TEE GOSPEL HIST. 301 

the Hegelians already noticed, practically they belong 
to the same category. There is the same self-conceit 
and self-deification, the same reckless disregard of 
facts, the same extravagant baselessness and ground- 
lessness of speculation. In one species of folly, they 
even exceed Gfroerer ; for while they admit the wri- 
tings of the apostolic fathers, Papias, Ignatius, Irenseus, 
etc., to be ancient and genuine, they affirm that the 
writings of the New Testament ascribed to John, Paul, 
Peter, etc., are spurious, and the product of a later 
age. They have been abundantly refuted by Thiersch, 
Ebrard, Dorner, and other writers; and though they 
are the most recent representatives of the sceptical 
spirit in Germany, and some of them (as for example, 
Baur), accomplished scholars and powerful writers, 
they are already growing obsolete, and fast hastening 
to a deserved oblivion. 

Truth alone is immutable and permanent ; error has 
numberless forms, and in all of them it is transient, 
and short-lived. 

After all these assaults and speculations the honest 
old Bible stands just where it did before, speaks the 
same language, exerts the same influence, and emits 
the same heavenly radiance. This sure word of proph- 
ecy will remain, and we do well to take heed to it, as to 
a light that shineth in a dark place, till the day dawn, 
and the day star arise in our hearts. 

The enormous self-confidence and self-estimation of 
this whole class of Gospel assailers, most forcibly re- 
minds us of the words of Holy writ : Seest thou a man 
wise in his oion conceit f there is more hope of a fool 
than of him. God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace 
to the humble. 



302 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE 



THE REAL VALUE OF THESE SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL 

HISTORY. 

These assaults on the Gospels consist of two parts, 
namely, 1, Objections to the historical truth of the 
Gospels, derived from the narrative itself, and, 2, Hy- 
potheses to account for the existence and influence of 
the Gospels, supposing them to be historically untrue. 
It is these hypotheses only which we have thus far 
considered. The objections are matters of detail, and 
must be considered in detail, and there is no room for 
them in a volume of this kind. A few will be selected 
as specimens of the whole, and answers given to them 
which will show how all the rest may be answered. 

In considering"these objections, we must always bear 
it in mind that the Gospels are not, and do not profess 
to be, complete histories. They are simply detached 
memoirs, or select anecdotes, intended solely to illus- 
trate the character and teachings of Christ, to show 
what kind of a teacher he was, and to give an idea of 
the substance and manner of his teaching. This the 
writers themselves affirm in so many words. Says 
John, at the close of his narrative : There are also 
many other things which Jesus did, the ivhich, if they 
should he written every one, I suppose that even the 
ivorld itself could not contain the boohs that should be 
written. 

And many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence 
of his disciples, which are not ivritten in this booh 
But these are written that ye might believe that Jesus is 
the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing ye might 
have life through his name. John xxi. 25 ; xx. 30, 31. 




; 



i I! 



SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HIST. 303 

Out of the countless multitude of events in our Sav- 
iour's life, and from his numberless teachings, the differ- 
ent evangelists select different transactions and different 
discourses for this purpose, all equally appropriate, as 
would also have been thousands of others which are 
left unrecorded. The evangelists sometimes repeat 
each other, but very often they do not ; and not one of 
them undertakes, or pretends, to give a complete narra- 
tive of all that Jesus did and said, but on the contrary, 
they all carefully and expressly disclaim any such un- 
dertaking or intention. 

The most plausible of the objections to which we 
allude, are derived from supposed contradictions in 
the Gospel narrative ; but such contradictions are as- 
sumed and supposed ; they have never yet been proved. 

For example, in Luke vii. 1-10, we are informed, 
that when Jesus was in Capernaum, a centurion there 
sent friends to him, requesting him to heal a sick serv- 
ant of his, who was very dear to him. 

In John iv. 46-53, we are told, that when Jesus was 
in Cana, a nobleman of Capernaum, whose son was 
sick, went himself to Jesus, and asked him to heal his 
son. 

In both cases the sick person was restored without 
being seen by Jesus. 

Because there are points of similarity in the two 
narratives, the objectors assume that they are intended 
as narratives of the same event ; and then they point 
out the discrepancies between them, to show that the 
Gospel history is unworthy of credit. The fallacious- 
ness of this mode of reasoning, especially when con- 
sidered in connection with the nature of the Gospel 



304 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBL'E. 

narrative as already pointed out, is very easily demon- 
strated. We will suppose two discourses by two dif- 
ferent authors, intended to illustrate American charac- 
ter by incidents of American history. One of these 
authors gives in illustration, the battle of Baltimore ; 
the other, the battle of New Orleans in 1815. In these 
two battles there were remarkable coincidences, as 
well as remarkable diversities. They both took place 
during the same war ; in both, an assault was made by 
a British army on an American city ; in both, the 
British commander was killed, and his troops repulsed. 
But, in the one case there were cotton-bale intrench- 
ments ; in the other, there were none. In the one 
battle, Gen. Jackson gained great celebrity ; in the 
other, he was not present. One battle occurred on the 
southern border of the United States ; the other, on 
the eastern. Some fifteen hundred or two thousand 
years hence, a Hegelian critic gets hold of these two 
discourses — and for the sake of destroying the credit 
of both, affirms that they both refer to the same bat- 
tle ; and gives the purpose and object of the writers, 
namely, the illustration of American character from 
American history, and states all the resemblances, to 
prove that they do both intend the same event ; and 
then states all the discrepancies to show that they are 
not reliable histories. He will not hear to the sug- 
gestion that they may be giving accounts of different 
battles — the similarities are too numerous and striking 
to admit of that idea ; nor will he allow that one of 
the two narratives, after all, may be true, for the style 
and tone of the 'two are so exactly alike, that if one 
is false, the other must certainly be false also. 



SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HIST. 305 

This is a fair illustration of a multitude of the most 
plausible and strongest of the objections of Strauss 
and his colaborers ; and sometimes they are even ten- 
fold more fallacious and absurd than this. 

For example, Luke xvii. 11-19, at the gate of the 
city of Nain, Jesus raised from the dead a young man, 
the only son of a widowed mother. 

Mark v. 35-43, in the house of Jairus, a ruler of the 
synagogue, Jesus raises from the dead a daughter of 
this Jairus f a little girl twelve years old. 

Now, says Gfroerer, there are such resemblances in 
these narratives, that they must be identical, yet so 
diverse are they, that they destroy the historical credit 
of the writers. The difference of place, the difference 
of sex in both parent and child, the diversity of all 
the attending circumstances, prove, not that they were 
two different transactions, but that the writers are not 
truthful ; for the resemblances are so strong, that the 
proof of identity is irresistible, whatever improbabili- 
ties may intervene. What are these resemblances 
which make the conclusion of identity so irresistible ! 

Why, these and these only — (1) they were both 
young people, (2) they each had a living parent, (3) 
they both died, and (4) they were both raised from 
the dead. By the same kind of argument we might 
prove irresistibly, and in spite of all inherent improb- 
abilities, the identity of Gen. Jackson and Mr. Yan 
Buren's grandmother, that they were one and the same 
person — for (1) they were both old people, (2) they 
were both very fond of Mr. Yan Buren, (3) they both 
died, and (4) they neither of them ever rose from the 
dead — and the difference of sex, and name, and place 
20 



306 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

of abode, and all things of that kind are merely the 
discrepancies of unreliable historians. 

Such is the character of the objections which these 
critics make — such is the kind of contradictions which 
they point out — and when we examine their hypotheses, 
we find them quite as baseless as their objections, and 
even more so. Their positive side is no more tenable 
than their negative. Their constructive efforts are even 
more decided failures than their destructive. 

Their hypotheses have absolutely nothing to stand 
upon. They are made wholly out of air and fog, and 
the moment the sun shines on them they are gone. 
We can at any time and on any historical subject what- 
ever, make a thousand suppositions, all false, yet all as 
plausible as any of these. That fine piece of bur- 
lesque by Archbishop Whately, entitled "Historical 
Doubts respecting Napoleon Bonaparte," in which he 
shows how exceedingly improbable it is that any such 
person as Napoleon ever existed, is tenfold more plaus- 
ible and sustained by arguments tenfold stronger 
than many of these Hegelian hypotheses of the Gos- 
pel history. 

In all their hypotheses they entirely mistake the 
times and the men wherein the Gospel history origin- 
ated. Their theories are such as could have arisen 
only in the minds of studious, speculative men, greatly 
in want of something to do, and driven to the neces- 
sity of inventing something to say that shall be new, 
striking and attractive, in order to draw attention to 
themselves and their sayings ; and they seem to imag- 
ine that the early promoters of Christianity were very 



SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HIST. 307 

much the same kind of men and in very nearly the 
same circumstances as themselves. Their theories all 
smell very strongly of the shop. In their judgment 
of the evangelists, apostles and martyrs of the early 
church, they are quite as much out of the way, as an 
exquisite of the west end of London would be, if he 
were to undertake, from his own feelings, purposes 
and daily employments, to form an estimate of the 
feelings, purposes and daily employments of a back- 
woodsman in the Western States of America. Were 
they to ask me the question : " Why are we not quali- 
fied to write critiques of the Gospel history ?'"— I 
would reply to them, as Henry More did to Southey, 
when he inquired: " Why am not I qualified to write 
a biography of John Wesley?" "Sir, thou hast 
nothing to draw with, and the well is deep." 

To think of the apostle John writing his Gospel as 
Weisse supposes— or the early teachers of Christianity 
inventing myths as Strauss imagines— what can be 
conceived more utterly inappropriate to the times and 
the men— more entirely beyond the limits of all inhe- 
rent probability? Indeed, these German unbelievers 
do not intend to be probable, nor have they any seri- 
ous purpose of discovering and advocating truth. 
They delight in a sort of intellectual gladiatorship,' 
and nothing with them is too serious to be made a 
plaything of. They sport with God and eternity, with 
heaven and hell, with their own souls and the souls of 
their fellow-men ; all the while thinking only of the fine 
and fruitful subjects they are getting for lectures and 
books— but when their speculations are imported into 
this land of serious purpose and earnest endeavor and 



308 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

practical results, they become immediately matters of 
life and death, of eternal life and eternal death, to 
thousands. That which is a fashionable, though far 
from an innocent, amusement in Germany, is a deadly, 
death dealing work in America. 

But what are these myths, of which these assailants 
of the Gospel say so much ? They suppose them to 
be fanciful or fabulous narratives, having but a remote 
resemblance to events of actual occurrence, and in- 
tended mainly to embody certain general ideas, which 
the inventors wished in this way to preserve for the 
world. According to Strauss, the myths of the Gos- 
pel illustrate mainly the dominion of mind over nature. 
The very idea of such myths so near the time and the 
place of the alleged occurrence of the events, presents 
to the sober mind nothing but the aspect of a blank 
impossibility. According to Strauss's own showing, 
not a single generation had passed away, before the 
myths began to spring up like mushrooms on the very 
soil of Palestine itself. As well might we now have a 
mythical history of the last war with Great Britain, or 
myths of the presidential election in 1840 — and these 
poetical romances, these moral apologues, these elabo- 
rate fictions designed to illustrate great moral truths, 
invented and put in circulation by the hard old soldiers 
and the tough old politicians who took a leading part 
in the actual events, (whatever they might be) — and 
implicitly believed as actual matters of fact by the 
simple hearted people who did the fighting and the 
voting ! Surely the legends and religious fables of 
the patristic and mediaeval period do not equal in 
baselessness and extravagance the inventions and hy~ 



SUBSTITUTES FOR THE GOSPEL HIST. 309 

potheses of these philosophic Gospel-assailers in the 
middle of the nineteenth century ; and besides, the for- 
mer have at least the advantage of being imbued with 
the spirit of veneration and the love of God, of which 
the latter have not a particle. 

True, there were apocryphal gospels, containing 
romances and myths — but these, for the most part, 
were remote both in time and place from the actual 
scenes of the Gospel history, and written after men 
had begun to withdraw into deserts and caves and con- 
vents, to spend their lives in solitude and mortification, 
hoping thereby to gain the favor of God ; instead of 
going about doing good, as Christ did, and as he taught 
all the early preachers of Christianity to do. 

Theodore Parker occasionally says some very good 
things, and he happily illustrates the folly of this whole 
method of inventing history in regard to the Gospels 
rather than studying history, by applying it to an im- 
portant event in our own American annals. He says : 

" The story of the Declaration of Independence is 
liable to many objections, if we examine it a la mode 
Strauss. The Congress was held at a mythical town, 
whose very name is suspicious, — Philadelphia, — broth- 
erly love. The date is suspicious, it was the fourth 
day of the fourth month (reckoning from April, as it 
is probable the Heraclidae and Scandinavians, possible 
that the aboriginal Americans, and certain that the 
Hebrews did). Now four was a sacred number with 
the Americans ; the president was chosen for four 
years ; there were four departments of affairs ; four 
divisions of the political powers, namely, the people, 
the congress, the executive, and the judiciary, etc. 



310 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Besides, which is still more incredible, three of the 
presidents, two of whom, it is alleged, signed the de- 
claration, died on the fourth of July, and the two lat- 
ter exactly fifty years after they had signed it, and 
about the same hour of the day. The year also is 
suspicious; 1776 is but an ingenious combination of 
the sacred number, four, which is repeated three times, 
and then multiplied by itself to produce the date ; 
thus 444x4=1776. . . . Still farther, the declar- 
ation is metaphysical, and presupposes an acquaintance 
with the transcendental philosophy on the part of the 
American people. Now the " Kritik of Pure Reason " 
was not published till after the declaration was made. 
Still farther, the Americans were never, to use the 
nebulous expression of certain philosophers, an "idealo- 
transcendental-and-subjective," but an " objective-and- 
concretivo-practical " people, to the last degree ; there- 
fore a metaphysical document, and most of all a " legal- 
congressional-metaphysical " document, is highly sus- 
picious if found among them. Besides, Hualteperah, 
the great historian of Mexico, a neighboring state, 
never mentions this document; and farther still, if 
this declaration had been made, and accepted by the 
whole nation, as it is pretended, then we can not ac- 
count for the fact, that the fundamental maxim of that 
paper, namely, the soul's equality to itself — " all men 
are born free and equal " — was perpetually lost sight 
of, and a large portion of the people kept in slavery ; 
still later, petitions, — supported by this fundamental 
article — for the abolition of slavery, were rejected 
by Congress with unexampled contempt, when, if 
the history is not mythical, slavery never had a legal 



SUBSTITUTES FOE THE GOSPEL HIST. 311 

existence after 1776, etc., etc. But we could go on 
this way forever." 

The reader will notice that the names of Polycarp 
and Irenaeus occur in this volume as witnesses to 
nearly every book of the New Testament. To show 
how immediately these witnesses are connected with 
the apostles themselves, and that there is absolutely 
no room and no time for the formation of the myths 
on which Strauss, and Renan, and the other roman- 
cers on the Gospel history rely, we close this chapter 
with an extract of a letter from Irenaeus to Flori- 
nus, an elder in the church at Rome. (Euseb. E. H. 
v. 20. 

" For I saw thee when I was yet a boy in the lower 
Asia with Polycarp, moving in great splendour at 
court, and endeavoring by all means to gain his es- 
teem. I remember the events of those times much 
better than those of more recent occurrence. As the 
studies of our youth growing with our minds, unite 
with it so firmly that I can tell also the very place 
where the blessed Polycarp was accustomed to sit and 
discourse ; and also his entrances, his walks, the com- 
plexion of his life and the form of his body, and his 
conversations with the people, and his familiar inter- 
course with John, as he was accustomed to tell, as also 
his familiarity with those that had seen the Lord. 
How also he used to relate their discourses, and what 
things he had heard from them concerning the Lord. 
Also concerning his miracles, his doctrine, all these 
were told by Polycarp, in consistency with the holy 
Scriptures, as he had received them from the eye wit- 
nesses of the doctrine of salvation. These things, by 



312 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

the mercy of God, and the opportunity then afforded 
me, I attentively heard, noting them down, not on 
paper, but in my heart ; and these same facts I am 
always in the habit, by the grace of God, to recall 
faithfully to mind." 

The same facts also are stated by Irenaeus, Contra 
Haer. iii. 3, 4. Notice here that Irenaeus had the 
Christian Scriptures at the same time that he had the 
oral testimony of Polycarp. 



CHAPTER NINTH. 

ACTS OF THE APOSTLES AND THE APOCRYPHAL ACTS. 
ACTS OF THE APOSTLES. 

From the first sentence in this book it is seen that 
Luke intended it for a continuation of his Gospel 
rather than a separate work. The Gospel was an ac- 
count of what Jesus began to do and teach while on 
earth in person, and the Acts, of what he continued, 
after his ascension to heaven, to do and teach through 
his apostles and by the Holy Spirit which he had 
promised. Throughout the Acts it is Jesus who does 
and teaches as really as in the Gospel. It is Jesus 
who works the miracles, sustains Stephen, delivers and 
enlightens Peter, converts and encourages and teaches 
Paul, and so on through the book. The headings or 
titles of the different books of the New Testament, as 
of ancient books generally, were usually the work of 
the publishers of the manuscript rather than of the 
original authors. Hence the titles are somewhat varied 
in successive publications ; in the New Testament books 
the most ancient being the shortest and simplest. 
Thus in this book, the older manuscripts are entitled, 
Acts of Apostles, Acting of Apostles, The Acts of the 
Apostles, The Acts of the Holy Apostles, Luke the Evan- 
gelist's Acts of the Apostles, and then toward the mid- 



314 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

die ages, Acts of the holy and all-praiseworthy Apos- 
tles, written by the holy, illustrious and all-praiseworthy 
Luke the Evangelist. The oldest titles, Acts or Acting 
of Apostles, are much the most appropriate, for the 
book does not profess to give a full history of the 
apostolic doings, or of any of the apostles ; but the 
same course is pursued as in the Gospels ; a few lead- 
ing pictures are presented, more or less connected 
with each other, to give the reader an idea of what 
the apostles did and how they discharged the impor- 
tant trusts committed to them. Only three of the 
apostles are particularly spoken of in the book, to wit, 
James, Peter, and Paul. Peter disappears from the 
book after his imprisonment by Herod and his escape 
aided by the angel (xii.), and appears but once after- 
wards, at the council of Jerusalem (xv.); while almost 
the entire book, from xiii. onward, is devoted to the 
life and labors of Paul. The narrative occupies the 
space of about thirty years ; there are but few chro- 
nological notices in it, and these not very precise ; the 
whole book is very brief, not much larger than some 
single sermons ; yet so full and varied is the informa- 
tion it conveys that it seems to the reader like a long 
history. The story is told not in the way of dry ab- 
stract, but of lively anecdote ; it combines in a won- 
derful degree condensation and fulness ; there is one 
systematic purpose throughout, but the most uncon- 
strained freedom of manner ; the style is perfectly sim- 
ple yet wonderfully graphic and animated, and is most 
skillfully varied as different persons and scenes are to 
be represented. This is seen to most advantage in 
the different speeches that are reported, for though 



ACTS OF THE APOSTLES 315 

they must be of necessity the very briefest of ab- 
stracts, they are each amazingly characteristic and 
peculiar. Paul addressing the rough Jews in the in- 
terior of Asia Minor, the polished Greeks of Athens, 
the furious mob at Jerusalem, Festus the governor 
and Agrippa the king at Csesarea, the elders of the 
church at Miletus, is always the same Paul, yet speak- 
ing in a style admirably varied to meet most skillfully 
the peculiar circumstances of each case. Never before 
nor since has an abbreviator of discourses retained so 
perfectly in every case the characteristic features of 
his original. It will be seen in the narrative of Paul's 
journeys that Luke generally accompanied him from 
xvi. onward, but was sometimes separated from him. 
Chrysostom testifies that the book was read daily in 
the churches between Easter and Pentacost in his time 
(Horn. i. 477), though it was introduced later for 
church reading than some of the other books. The 
chief witnesses for the Acts are Barnabas, Clement of 
Rome, Ignatius, Poly carp, Papias, Dionysius of Corinth, 
Justin Martyr, the Church of Vienne and Lyons, Ire- 
naeus, Tatian, Athenagoras, Clement of Alexandria, 
Tertullian, Origen, Eusebius, Jerome. The testimony 
is full, varied and explicit, but only a few brief speci- 
mens can be given here. 

Ignatius. " After his resurrection he did eat and 
drink with them." Acts x. 41. 

Papias. " This Justus is mentioned in the book of 
Acts as the one over which the apostles prayed," etc. 
i. 23, 24. 

Dionysius of Corinth. " Dionysius the Areopagite, 
who was converted to the faith by Paul the apostle, 



316 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

according to the statement in the Acts of the Apos- 
tles." 

Irenaeus. "But that Luke was inseparable from 
Paul, and his fellow-laborer in the Gospel he himself 
makes manifest, for he says." (Then Irenaeus quotes 
from the Acts the account of the separation of Paul 
and Barnabas, and their missionary journeys in differ- 
ent directions, and shows that Luke was with Paul 
from the narrative in xvi. 11, 13, 16, etc.) 

Athenagoras. " The world was made not as if God 
needed anything." xvii. 25. 

Tertullian. "It is stated in the commentary by 
Luke that at the third hour they were considered 
drunken." ii. 15. 

Origen. " In the Acts of the Apostles Stephen tes- 
tifies." 

Eusebius. " Luke has left us in two inspired books — ■ 
one of these is the Gospel — the other is his Acts of the 
Apostles. The Areopagite, called Dionysius, whom 
Luke has recorded in his Acts." iii. 4, also ii. 22. 

The testimony is full, unequivocal, uncontradicted, 
that Luke wrote the Acts of the Apostles, the same 
that we have in the New Testament ; and this the in- 
ternal evidence clearly shows. 

Church of Lyons and Vienne. "As Stephen the 
perfected martyr, Lord, lay not this sin to their 
charge." vii. 60. 

Clement of Alexandria. "As Luke in the Acts of 
the Apostles mentions Paul saying, Ye men of Athens." 
etc. xvii. 22, 23. 



THE APOCRYPHAL ACTS. 317 



APOCRYPHAL ACTS OF THE APOSTLES. 

Of these Prof. Teschendorf, the most indefatigable 
and successful scholar of modern times in this branch 
of literature, published in 1851, thirteen, to wit: 1, 
Acts of Peter and Paul ; 2, of Paul and Thecla ; 3, of 
Barnabas by Mark; 4, of Philip; 5, of Philip in 
Greece ; 6, of Andrew ; 7, of Andrew and Matthias ; 
8, Acts and Martyrdom of Matthew ; 9, Acts of Thom- 
as; 10, The Consummation (Teleiosis) of Thomas; 11, 
Acts of Bartholomew; 12, Acts of Thaddeus; 13, 
Acts of John. 

Some of these are of very early date, reaching as 
high at least as the beginning of the third or latter 
part of the second century ; but they were never de- 
livered to any of the churches, they were written for 
the most part, as Tertullian, Eusebius, Gelasius, Epiph- 
anius, Jerome, Augustin, and other ancient witnesses 
assure us (Tischendorf, Proleg.), in the interest of some 
particular error to which the churches were opposed, 
and they never had any very wide circulation. The 
most ancient existing manuscripts of these books are 
generally not earlier than the 10th or the 11th century ; 
and a slight inspection of them fully justifies the sound 
discretion of the early Christians in rejecting them. 
It is indeed surprising that books written so near the 
apostolic times, and among the class of people to whom 
the apostles preached, should be so entirely different 
from all the apostolic writings. To the candid thinker 
the contrast affords one of the most striking proofs of 
the absolute divine inspiration of the New Testament 
books. We will select for examination two of the 



318 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

best of these apocryphal Acts, those numbered 2 and 
7 in the enumeration of Tischendorf, and will endeavor 
to make the analysis sufficiently comprehensive to put 
the reader entirely in possession of the means of judg- 
ing between these and our sacred books. 

ACTS OF PAUL AND THECLA. 

This book must be very ancient, for it is mentioned 
by Tertullian, who was born A. D. 160. We have the 
most satisfactory evidence that the book, as we now 
read it, is to all intents and purposes the same as that 
which was read by Tertullian, though of course, as is 
the case with all ancient books, there are variations 
and errors in the written text. It sometimes had for 
its title, Concerning the holy and glorious and illustri- 
ous martyr Thecla, who was in Iconium. Thecla is a 
saint both in the Greek and Romish churches, and her 
virtues are celebrated by the latter on the 23d of Sep- 
tember. The two oldest manuscripts which Tischen- 
dorf found, are both in Paris, nd both of the eleventh 
century. 

Tertullian says the book was first written in the in- 
terest of those that held that women had the right to 
preach and baptize ; and it was much esteemed by the 
early Quakers as sustaining their views of the position 
of women in the church. 

The following extract, being the first five chapters 
in the old English translation by Archbishop Wake, 
will give a sufficient idea of the whole book, and ena- 
ble the reader to make a fair comparison between the 
best of the apocryphal and the canonical Acts : 



THE APOCRYPHAL ACTS. 319 

"When Paul went up to Iconium, after his flight from 
Antioch, Demas and Hermogenes became his compan- 
ions, who were then full of hypocrisy. But Paul, look- 
ing only at the goodness of God, did them no harm, 
but loved them greatly. Accordingly he endeavored 
to make agreeable to them all the oracles and doctrines 
of Christ, and the design of the Gospel of God's well- 
beloved Son, instructing them in the knowledge of 
Christ, as it was revealed to him. And a certain man 
named Onesiphorus, hearing that Paul was come to 
Iconium, went out speedily to meet him, together with 
his wife Lectra, and his sons Simmia and Zeno, to in- 
vite him to their house. For Titus had given them a 
description of Paul's personage, they as yet not know- 
ing him in person, but only being acquainted with his 
character. They went in the king's highway to Lystra, 
and stood there waiting for him, comparing all who 
passed by, with that description which Titus had given 
them. At length they saw a man coming (namely, 
Paul), of a low stature, bald (or shaved) on the head, 
crooked thighs, handsome legs, hollow-eyed ; had a 
crooked nose; full of grace; for sometimes he ap- 
peared as a man, sometimes he had the countenance 
of an angel. And Paul saw Onesiphorus, and was 
glad. And Onesiphorus said, Hail, thou servant of the 
blessed God. Paul replied, The grace of God be with 
thee and thy family. But Demas and Hermogenes 
were moved with envy, and under a show of great 
religion Demas said, and are not we also servants of 
the blessed God ? Why didst thou not salute us ? 
Onesiphorus replied, Because I have not perceived 
in you the fruits of righteousness ; nevertheless, if ye 



320 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

are of that sort, ye shall be welcome to my house also. 
Then Paul went into the House of Onesiphorus, 
and there was great joy among the family on that ac- 
count ; and they employed themselves in prayer, break- 
ing of bread, and hearing Paul preach the word of 
God concerning temperance and the resurrection, in 
the following manner ; Blessed are the pure in heart ; 
for they shall see God. Blessed are they who keep 
their flesh undefiled (or pure) ; for they shall be the 
temples of God. Blessed are the temperate (or 
chaste); for God will reveal himself to them. Blessed 
are they who abandon their secular enjoyments ; for 
they shall be accepted of God. Blessed are they who 
have wives, as though they had them not ; for they 
shall be made angels of God. Blessed are they who 
tremble at the word of God ; for they shall be com- 
forted. Blessed are they who keep their Baptism 
pure ; for they shall find peace with the Father, Son, 
and Holy Ghost. Blessed are they who pursue the 
wisdom (or doctrine) of Jesus Christ ; for they shall 
be called the sons of the Most High. Blessed are they 
who observe the instructions of Jesus Christ ; for they 
shall dwell in eternal light. Blessed are they, who for 
the love of Christ abandon the glories of the world ; 
for they shall judge angels, and be placed at the right 
hand of Christ, and shall not suffer the bitterness of 
the last judgment. Blessed are the bodies and souls 
of virgins ; for they are acceptable to God, and shall 
not lose the reward of their virginity ; for the word 
of their (heavenly) Father shall prove effectual to 
their salvation in the day of his Son, and they shall 
enjoy rest for evermore. 



THE APOCRYPHAL ACTS. 321 

While Paul was preaching this sermon in the church 
which was in the house of Onesiphorus, a certain virgin 
named Thecla (whose mother's name was Theoclia, and 
who was betrothed to a man named Thamyris) sat at 
a certain window in her house, from whence, by the 
advantage of a window in the house where Paul was, 
she both night and day heard Paul's sermons concern- 
ing God, concerning charity, concerning faith in Christ, 
and concerning prayer ; nor would she depart from 
the window, till with exceeding joy she was subdued 
to the doctrines of faith. At length, when she saw 
many women and virgins going in to Paul, she earnestly 
desired that she might be thought worthy to appear 
in his presence, and hear the word of Christ ; for she 
had not yet seen Paul's person, but only heard his ser- 
mons, and that alone. But when she would not be 
prevailed upon to depart from the window, her mother 
sent to Thamyris, who came with the greatest pleasure, 
as hoping now to marry her. Accordingly, he said to 
Theoclia, Where is my Thecla? Theoclia replied, 
Thamyris, I have something very strange to tell you ; 
for Thecla, for the space of three days, will not move 
from the window, not so much as to eat or drink, but 
is so intent on hearing the artful and delusive discourses 
of a certain foreigner, that I perfectly admire, Thamy- 
ris, that a young woman of her known modesty, will 
suffer herself to be so prevailed upon. For that man 
has disturbed the whole city of Iconium, and even 
your Thecla among others. All the women and young 
men flock to him to receive his doctrine ; who, besides 
all the rest, tells them, that there is but one God, who 
alone is to be worshipped, and that we ought to live 
21 



322 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

in chastity. Notwithstanding this, my daughter Thecla, 
like a spider's web, fastened to the window, is capti- 
vated by the discourses of Paul, and attends upon 
them with prodigious eagerness, and vast delight ; and 
thus, by attending on what he says, the young woman 
is seduced. Now then do you go, and speak to her, 
for she is betrothed to you. Accordingly Thamyris 
went, and having saluted her, taking care not to sur- 
prise her, he said, Thecla, my spouse, why sittest thou 
in this melancholy posture? What strange impres- 
sions are made upon thee? Turn to Thamyris, and 
blush. Her mother also spake to her after the same 
manner, and said, Child, why dost thou sit so melan- 
choly, and, like one astonished, makest no reply? 
Then they wept exceedingly ; Thamyris, that he had 
lost his spouse ; Theoclia, that she had lost her daugh- 
ter ; and the maids, that they had lost their mistress ; 
and there was a universal mourning in the family. 
But all these things made no impression upon Thecla, 
so as to incline her so much as to turn to them, and 
take notice of them; for she still regarded the dis- 
courses of Paul. Then Thamyris ran forth into the 
street, to observe who they were that went in to Paul, 
and came out from him ; and he saw two men engaged 
in a very warm dispute, and said to them : Sirs, what 
business have you here ? and who is that man within, 
belonging to you, who deludes the minds of men, both 
young men and virgins, persuading them, that they 
ought not to marry, but continue as they are? I 
promise to give you a considerable sum, if you will 
give me a just account of him; for I am the chief per- 
son of this city. Demas and Hermogenes replied, We 



THE APOCRYPHAL ACTS. 323 

can not so exactly tell who he is, but this we know, 
that he deprives young men of their (intended) wives, 
and virgins of their (intended) husbands, by teaching, 
there can be no future resurrection, unless ye continue 
in chastity, and do not defile your flesh. 

Then said Thamyris, Come along with me to my 
house, and refresh yourselves. So they went to a 
very splendid entertainment, where there was wine in 
abundance, and very rich provision. They were 
brought to a table very richly spread, and made to 
drink plentifully by Thamyris, on account of the love 
he had for Thecla, and his desire to marry her. Then 
Thamyris said, I desire you would inform me what the 
doctrines of this Paul are, that I may understand them ; 
for I am under no small concern about Thecla, seeing 
she delights in that stranger's discourses, so that I am in 
danger of losing my intended wife. Then Demas and 
Hermogenes answered both together, and said, Let 
him be brought before the governor Castellius, as one 
who endeavors to persuade the people into the new 
religion of the Christians, and he, according to the 
order of Caesar, will put him to death, by which means 
you will obtain your wife ; while we at the same time 
will teach her that the resurrection which he speaks 
of, is already come, and consists in our having children ; 
and that we then arose again, when we came to the 
knowledge of God. Thamyris, having this account 
from them, was filled with hot resentment ; and rising 
early in the morning, he went to the house of One- 
siphorus, attended by the magistrates, the jailor, and 
a great multitude of people with staves, and said to 
Paul, Thou hast perverted the city of Iconium, and, 



324 BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

among the rest, Thecla, who is betrothed to me, so that 
now she will not marry me. Thou shalt therefore go 
with us to the governor Castellius. And all the multi- 
tude cried out, Away with this impostor (magician), 
for he has perverted the minds of our wives, and all 
the people hearken to him. 

Then Thamyris, standing before the governor's judg- 
ment-seat, spake with a loud voice in the following 
manner : governor, I know not whence this man 
cometh ; but he is one who teaches that matrimony is 
unlawful. Command him therefore to declare before 
you for what reason he publishes such doctrines. While 
he was saying thus, Demas and Hermogenes whispered 
to Thamyris, and said, Say that he is a Christian, and 
he will presently be put to death. But the governor 
was more deliberate, and calling to Paul, he said, Who 
art thou ? What dost thou teach ? They seem to lay 
gross crimes to thy charge. Paul then spake with a 
loud voice, saying, As I am now called to give an ac- 
count, governor, of my doctrines, I desire your 
audience. That God, who is a God of vengeance, and 
who stands in need of nothing but the salvation of his 
creatures, has sent me to reclaim them from their 
wickedness and corruptions, from all (sinful) pleasures, 
and from death ; and to persuade them to sin no more. 
On this account, God sent his Son Jesus Christ, whom 
I preach, and in whom I instruct men to place their 
hopes, as that person who only had such compassion 
on the deluded world, that it might not, governor, 
be condemned, but have faith, the fear of God, the 
knowledge of religion, and the love of truth. So that 
if I only teach those things which I have received by 



THE APOCRYPHAL ACTS. 325 

revelation from God, where is my crime ? When the 
governor heard this, he ordered Paul to be bound, and 
to be put in prison, till he should be more at leisure to 
hear him more fully. But in the night, Thecla, taking 
off her ear-rings, gave them to the turnkey of the 
prison, who then opened the doors to her, and let her 
in ; and when she made a present of a silver looking- 
glass to the jailer, was allowed to go into the room 
where Paul was ; then she sat down at his feet, and 
heard from him the great things of God. And as she 
preceived Paul not to be afraid of suffering, but that 
by divine assistance he behaved himself with courage, 
her faith so far increased, that she kissed his chains. 

At length Thecla was missed, and sought for by the 
family and by Thamyris in every street, as though she 
had been lost ; till one of the porter's fellow-servants 
told them, that she had gone out in the night time. 
Then they examined the porter, and he told them, that 
she was gone to the prison to the strange man. They 
went therefore according to his direction, and there 
found her ; and when they came out, they got a mob 
together, and went and told the governor all that hap- 
pened. Upon which he ordered Paul to be brought 
before his judgment-seat. Thecla in the mean time 
lay wallowing on the ground, in the prison, in that 
same place where Paul had sat to teach her ; upon which 
the governor also ordered her to be brought before 
his judgment-seat ; which summons she received with 
joy, and went. When Paul was brought thither, the 
mob with more vehemence cried out, He is a magi- 
cian ; let him die. Nevertheless, the governor attend- 
ed with pleasure upon Paul's discourses of the holy 



326 BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

works of Christ ; and, after a council called, he sum- 
moned Thecla, and said to her, Why do you not, accord- 
ing to the law of the Inconians, marry Thamyris ? She 
stood still, with her eyes fixed upon Paul ; and finding 
she made no reply, Theoclia her mother cried out, say- 
ing, Let the unjust creature be burnt ; let her be burnt 
in the midst of the theatre, for refusing Thamyris, that 
all women may learn from her to avoid such practices. 
Then the governor was exceedingly concerned, and 
ordered Paul to be whipped out of the city, and Thecla 
to be burnt. So the governor arose, and went imme- 
diately into the theatre ; and all the people went forth 
to see the dismal sight. But Thecla, just as a lamb in 
the wilderness looks every way to see his shepherd, 
looked around for Paul ; and as she was looking upon 
the multitude, she saw the Lord Jesus in the likeness 
of Paul, and said to herself, Paul is come to see me in 
my distressed circumstances. And she fixed her eyes 
upon him ; but he instantly ascended up to heaven, 
while she looked on him. Then the young men and 
women brought wood and straw for the burning of 
Thecla; who being brought naked to the stake, ex- 
torted tears from the governor, with surprise, at behold- 
ing the greatness of her beauty. And when they had 
placed the wood in order, the people commanded her 
to go upon it ; which she did, first making the sign of 
the cross. Then the people set fire to the pile ; though 
the flame was exceeding large, it did not touch her ; 
for God took compassion on her, and caused a great 
eruption from the earth beneath, and a cloud from 
above to pour down great quantities of rain and hail, 
insomuch that by the rupture of the earth, very many 



THE APOCRYPHAL ACTS. 327 

were in great danger, and some were killed, the fire 
was extinguished, and Thecla preserved. 

ACTS OF ANDREW AND MATTHIAS IN THE CITY OF THE 

CANNIBALS. 

In some authorities the latter apostle is Matthew in- 
stead of Matthias, though the above title is the usual 
one. With some the city of the cannibals is Sinope, 
in Pontus of the Scythians, while others suppose it to 
be Myrmene in Ethiopia. The book is ancient, but 
not so old as the preceding ; and it exists in the man- 
uscript and other authorities with very considerable 
variations. The two oldest manuscripts used by Tisch- 
endorf, are in Paris, and of the 11th and the 15th 
century. There are also a few fragments in Paris in 
the uncial letters, which Tischendorf and Thilo judge 
to be as early as the 8th century. 

The following brief analysis of the story will give 
the reader a correct idea of the book, and enable him 
to make an intelligible comparison between it and the 
Acts in the New Testament. 

The twelve apostles were gathered together and as- 
signed their different missionary fields by lot, and it 
fell to Matthias to go to the country of the cannibals. 
Instead of bread and water, the cannibals ate the flesh 
and drank the blood of strangers who visited their 
coast. They put out the eyes of tlese unhappy wan- 
derers and gave them a bewitching draught, which 
deprived them of their reason, so that they wandered 
about eating hay and grass like cattle. Immediately 
on the arrival of the man of God, they put him in 
chains, destroyed his eyes, and gave him the bewitch- 



3*28 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

ing drink But he retained his reason and continued 
to praise the Lord. At night, in prison, he shed bit- 
ter tears and offered earnest prayers to God. Sudden- 
ly the prison was illuminated and a heavenly voice 
assured him that he would soon be delivered from his 
distress by Andrew, who would shortly visit his prison. 
Every thirty days the heathen held a solemn assembly 
in which they designated the prisoner who in his 
turn would be served as a meal at their public table. 
Matthias awaited with patience his approaching doom. 
Meanwhile Andrew, who was preaching in Achaia, 
received from heaven a command that he should in 
three days go to the city of the cannibals, where his 
brother and companion was in danger. At first he 
hesitated, it was a great distance and he did not know 
the way ; but God commanded him to hasten to the 
sea-shore early the next morning. When Andrew and 
his companions reached the shore at the appointed 
time, he saw a skiff approaching manned with three 
sailors. These were Jesus the Almighty God, and two of 
his angels, all disguised in human form like common 
men, and Andrew, not knowing them, asked for a 
passage. At first the boat-master declined unless he 
was paid the passage money ; but when Andrew as- 
sured him that he had neither money nor goods, but 
was an apostle of the blessed Saviour, and was travel- 
ling under his Master's directions, he and his associates 
were received into the boat. Andrew admired the 
youthful beauty and handiness of the boat-master, who 
directed his angels to refresh the poor pilgrims with 
food. A severe storm arose, and the companions of 
Andrew were afraid. The boat-master offered to set 



THE APOCRYPHAL ACTS. 329 

them ashore, but they were ashamed to seek their own 
safety and leave the apostle. Andrew comforted them 
and reminded them that the blessed Savior had once 
suddenly stilled a like violent tempest. They fell 
asleep, the waves were calmed, and Andrew entered 
into edifying conversation with the heavenly boat- 
master. He asked of the apostle an accurate narrative 
of the deeds and miracles of the Saviour. Andrew re- 
lated how that Christ, when teased by the unbelieving 
multitude for a miracle, commanded the statues of the 
Cherubim and Seraphim, which were fixed on the 
walls of the temple, to come down and go to Mamre, 
and there call the three great patriarchs from their 
graves ; and thus he gave them an irresistible proof of 
his divine power. In such conversation the time 
passed ; and at length Andrew, overcome with weari- 
ness, fell asleep. In this condition God directed his 
angels to bear him safely to the shore, where on awak- 
ing the next morning he found himself in sight of the 
prison of Matthias. His associates were also asleep 
beside him, whom he aroused and informed them that 
the man with whom they had sailed the day before, 
could have been none other than the Supreme Being, 
the Lord Jesus Christ. Indeed, they answered, while 
we were asleep, eagles came and took our souls and 
bore them through the air to heaven; and there we 
heard an innumerable company of angels, with a thou- 
sand voices, praising the Lord God, and we saw the 
twelve apostles standing before the Son of God, and 
the angels ministering to them. 

Delighted with this vision, Andrew offered thanks- 
giving to God, and besought pardon of the Creator, 



330 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

for all lie had said the day before, without recognizing 
the Almighty on board the boat. Then God again 
made himself visible and spake peace to him, and said, 
Thou wert guilty of a greater sin in Achaia, when thou 
didst despond on account of the long distance and 
the voyage by sea, for all things are possible with God. 
But go up to the prison and deliver thy brother and his 
fellow prisoners. Then thy sorrows will begin, but 
endure them steadfastly, and remember the torments 
which I suffered on the cross. Invisibly then, for the 
hand of God covered his steps, Andrew came up to 
the prison. Seven sentries stood before the door, and 
they suddenly fell dead. The door of itself sprang 
open, the heathen were in a drunken sleep, and Mat- 
thias sat alone in the murderer's den. The apostles 
recognized and embraced and kissed each other, and 
then knelt down and prayed. Matthias now without 
delay proposed to leave the prison, he and two hun- 
dred and forty others, whose way God concealed by a 
cloud, so that no swift messenger of the enemy could 
overtake them. Andrew attended them, and then 
cheerfully returned to the city and sat down by a bra- 
zen pillar to await what might happen. 

Meanwhile the time of the heathen festival ap- 
proached, and the heathen designed to bring out one 
of the prisoners and devote him to death. But they 
M were disappointed. They found the prison open and 
the sentries dead. The frightful tidings spread, and 
hunger and terror took possession of the multitude. All 
the citizens were called together and lots cast to de- 
termine who should be slain, that his body might af- 
ford food for the rest. The lot fell upon a respectable 



THE APOCRYPHAL ACTS. 331 

old man, whom they immediately bound. Lamenting 
he offered them his young son instead, whom the hun- 
gry multitude gladly accepted. Now the youth being 
fettered, raised a bitter cry, and Andrew, who saw all 
from his pillar, was inwardly moved by it. He prayed 
to God for the innocent one, and was heard, for the 
weapons which they directed against the boy melted 
like wax. The boy was set free, but raging hunger 
again began to be felt among the people. 

Now the Devil, black and hateful, appeared in the 
form of a miserable man, and betrayed the presence 
of the saint, who had caused the prisoners to escape, 
that against him all the wrath of the people might be 
turned. Andrew ridiculed the fiend, who only inflam- 
ed the people the more. A divine voice directed the 
apostle to come out from behind the pillar and show 
himself to the people. His hands were now bound 
and the multitude dragged him through the streets 
and over stones and rocks all day till evening ; his 
body was torn and trickled with blood, but his soul 
was steadfast and believing. Andrew spent the night 
in prison ; but early in the morning he is again beset, 
and his tortures commence anew. The cries of the 
sufferer ascend to heaven ; the Devil excites the multi- 
tude more and more ; in the evening he comes with 
six others to insult Andrew, but is driven off by the 
sign of the cross. 

On the third morning the»tortures are again renew- 
ed, and are continued through the day. Andrew 
prays and longs for death, his blood is spread over the 
ground, his hairs are scattered along the way. The 
heavenly King directs him to look back, and he sees 



332 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

blossoming trees growing up in the places where the 
drops of blood had fallen ; and when the enemies had 
for the fourth time brought the saint back to his prison, 
God drew near and greeted him and gave strength 
and soundness to his wounded body as at the begin- 
ning. 

Now he noticed by the wall two large weather- 
stained stone pillars, and one of them he thus ad- 
dressed : It is the will of God, the Almighty, that 
streams should pour forth from thee among the heathen 
people. Thou art resplendent with gold, and in an- 
cient times the Lord was pleased to write on thee his 
ten commandments ; but to-day there is reserved for 
thee a still greater honor, for thou shalt proclaim the 
counsel of God. Scarcely had the saint uttered these 
words, when the stone was rent, and endless floods of 
water were poured forth from it, which increased to a 
mighty river. Many children were drowned and the 
men tried to flee to the mountains ; but an angel with 
a flaming sword stopped the way, the waves increased, 
the wilderness howled, and fire-brands flew about 
There was a universal yell of grief and terror ; and at 
length one cried aloud, You see now for yourselves 
that we have laid the innocent stranger in chains; 
therefore a frightful punishment awaits us ; hurry, let 
us unchain him and beg of him for help. They has- 
tened to unbind him, but the water still increased, and 
the flood became so great that it reached to the neck 
and shoulders of the men. But Andrew addressed 
the water-flood, and the heavens became fair, and the 
earth opened its mouth and drank in the waters. 
Fourteen of the worst men were drawn into the abyss 



THE APOCRYPHAL ACTS. 333 

and disappeared from the earth. All the people trem- 
bled for fear and acknowledged that God had sent this 
holy man. Andrew warned and exhorted, and uttered 
a prayer for the souls of the children who had found 
death in the flood. The prayer was acceptable to the 
Most High. He ordered that they should rise from 
the dead ; and as soon as they had returned to life 
they were baptized and received under the divine pro- 
tection. In the place where the flood sprung up and 
baptism was administered, Andrew caused a church to 
be built ; and from all places men and women were 
assembled and were baptized and renounced the service 
of the Devil and the heathen altars. Afterwards An- 
drew appointed a pious bishop over them by the name 
of Plato, and longed himself to leave the country and 
go over the sea. All were grieved that he would de- 
depart from them so soon, and a voice from heaven 
warned him that he should remain yet seven days 
longer with his new flock and confirm their faith. So 
long did he teach and strengthen them, to the disgust 
of the Devil, who saw all these people delivered from 
hell. At the expiration of the appointed time, An- 
drew prepared himself for his journey, the people 
accompanied him with sadness to the shore, looked 
after the ship so long as their eyes could follow it, and 
praised the eternal God. 

The above extract is modeled on the argument to 
an old Anglo-Saxon poem published by J. Grimm, 
which gives a very good general idea of the book. 
The book itself is quite too long to be inserted here, 
and in this case an abstract is better than extracts. 
In this poem it is throughout Matthew who wrote the 
Gospel, that is the associate of Andrew. 



334 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Here we have a fair example of the best of the 
Acts of the Apostles out of the New Testament. Is 
not the difference quite as great and of the same kind 
as that which we have already shown to exist between 
the apocryphal gospels and the canonical ? Would it 
not be an insult to the common sense of the reader 
even to propose to him the question seriously whether 
the two classes of books could have proceeded from 
the same source ? The apocryphal Acts were among 
the best products of the human mind of that period 
and among the people who were nominally Christian, 
and the canonical Acts, as the contrast shows, must 
have been from the divine and not the human mind. 



CHAPTER TENTH. 

THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL. 

The following is the chronological order in which 
the epistles of Paul were written : Thessalonians I. and 
II, Galatians, Corinthians I. and II., Romans, Ephe- 
sians, Colossians, Philemon, Philippians, Hebrews, I. 
Timothy, Titus, II. Timothy. 

As this book is written for those who use the com- 
mon editions of the Greek Testament, and the com- 
mon translations, it will be more convenient for the 
reader that we follow the usual arrangement. 

EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS. 

That this epistle is a genuine production of the 
apostle Paul, is susceptible of the most satisfactory 
proof, and the fact has seldom been seriously called in 
question. The objections of the Englishman Evanson, 
published about a century since, never made much im- 
pression and they have been abundantly refuted. The 
testimony of the early Christian writers is full and 
unanimous. We have direct testimony from Irenaeus 
(adv. Haer. III. xvi. 3), Tertullian (de Cor. Mil. c. 6, 
adv. Prax. c. 13), Clemens Alex. (Paed. i. p. 117, 
Strom, iii. 457), Origen, who wrote a commentary on 
this epistle, etc., etc. The indirect testimony also of 



336 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

quotations and allusions is equally copious and reliable, 
e. g. Clemens Rom. (Ep. i. ad Cor. ii. 35), Poly carp 
(ad Phil. c. 6), Theophilus of Antioch (ad Autol. ii. 
p. 99 ; iii. p. 18), the letter of the churches of Vienne 
and Lyons, quoted by Eusebius (E. H. v. 1), and many 
others. (Compare Guericke, New Test. Isagog. p. 
329-30.) The internal evidence is no less clear and 
explicit. See Paley's Horae Paulinse chap, i., ii. 

But why did the apostle write to the Romans in the 
Greek language ? Why did he not write in Latin ? 
The members of the church at Rome were not exclu- 
sively or principally natives of Rome or even of Italy. 
The population of Rome at that time was composed 
of persons from every part of the Roman empire, from 
every nation under heaven, and with them Greek was 
the common language of social intercourse, business and 
literature. The native Romans themselves neglected 
their own language and used Greek. Tacitus de Or. 
c. 29 ; Martial, Epig. xiv. 56 ; Juvenal, Lat. vi. 184-9. 

Authors, Christian, Jewish and Pagan, living at 
Rome, composed their works in Greek, as Clement, 
Justin Martyr, Josephus, Plutarch, Epictetus, the em- 
peror Marcus Aurelius (see Tholuck and Alford on 
Romans) ; and among the common people, with whom 
the Christians would generally be found, the predomi- 
nant language was Greek. Juvenal, Sat. iii. 60-80. 

If Paul then wished to be understood by the great 
body of the church members at Rome, it was necessa- 
ry that he should write in Greek rather than Latin. 

The epistle was written at Corinth, probably during 
the winter of A. D. 57-58. Paul had then been a 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL. 337 

preacher of the Gospel twenty-eight years. A part 
of the summer A. D. 57 he had spent in Ephesus, the 
remainder of the summer and the autumn in Macedo- 
nia ; and he was passing the three winter months at 
Corinth, whence he was about to make a journey to 
Jerusalem, with the contributions to the saints, in the 
spring. Acts xx. 2, 3 ; 1 Cor. xv. 25, xvi. 6. 

Phoebe, a deaconess of the church at Cenchrea, the 
eastern seaport of Corinth, had occasion to go to Rome 
on business, and the apostle took the opportunity to 
send a letter by her to the important church there, 
though he had himself then never visited that city. 
Compare Acts xix. 21, xx. 1, 2, 6 ; Rom. xv. 24, 28, 
xiv. 1, 21, 23 ; 1 Cor. i. 14. Among the members 
of the church at Rome were some of Paul's relatives 
(Rom. xvi. 7), and some of his intimate friends, with 
whom he had been acquainted before their residence 
in Rome. He speaks of Rufus in particular, and 
sends salutation to the mother of Rufus as his own 
mother (Rom. xvi. 13). Was this Rufus the son of 
Simon the Cyrenian (Mark xv. 21), who bore the cross 
of Jesus? And was Paul an inmate of that family 
while he studied at Jerusalem ? 

Among the persons converted at Jerusalem during 
the first pentecost after our Lord's ascension, are men- 
tioned sojourning Romans (Acts ii. 10), and among 
the distinguished teachers of that church, Paul men- 
tions some of his own kinsmen (Rom. xvi. 7) who 
were Christians before he was. It is probable, then, 
that the first foundations of the Roman church were 
laid by Jewish Christians who had been converted by 

the preaching of Peter. The statements in the book 
99. 



'338 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

of Acts make it impossible for us to believe that either 
Paul or Peter were at Rome during the early period 
of the existence of that church. We may, how- 
ever, without hesitation admit the historical fact that 
they were both there during the latter part of their 
lives, though probably their stay was but brief, Paul's 
first visit being about two years, and his second a much 
shorter time, and Peter's whole stay scarcely exceed- 
ing one year. It is not likely that either apostle ever 
held any official connection with that particular church 
(Alford, Proleg. to Rom. sec. 2). Paul's own state- 
ments show that he had not been at Rome when he 
wrote this epistle (Rom. i. 10, 13, 15, xv. 23), and we 
have the testimony of Origen that Peter did not come 
to Rome till quite the latter part of his life (Euseb. E. 
H. iii. 1), and there is no testimony in the Bible or in 
Christian antiquity to the contrary effect in regard to 
either. All the probabilities are decidedly in favor 
of the conclusion above stated. 

It is obvious enough from the very nature of the 
case, and perfectly certain from the contents of the 
epistle, that the church at Rome was made up of both 
Jewish and Gentile Christians. Chap. ii. 17, iii. 19, iv. 
1, 12, vii. 1-4, ix, xi, plainly have reference to Jews; 
while i. 16-32, vi. 17, ix. 24, 30, xi. 13-25, 28, 30, xiv. 
1, xv. 14, as plainly refer to Gentiles. Perhaps it 
would not be easy to come to any certain conclusion 
as to the relative strength of these two component 
parts of the church ; yet from some passages, as i. 5, 
6, 13, xv. 16, we might infer that the Gentile part 
was the more powerful and influential. 

The epistle, unlike the others we have from Paul, 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL. 339 

except that to the Ephesians, was not called forth by 
any particular exigency in the church, nor is it de- 
signed to meet any peculiar circumstances. On this 
account its discussions stand on a broader basis and its 
topics are of a more general character, than those of 
the ' other epistles, with the exception already men- 
tioned. In consequence of this general dogmatic 
character of the book, it occupies the first place in 
almost all manuscripts and printed editions of the 
epistles, though not by any means the first written in 
the order of time ; the two to the Thessalonians, that 
to the Galatians, and the two to the Corinthians, 
having all preceded it, making the Romans the sixth 
instead of the first. The epistles would be much bet- 
ter understood if read in the order in which they were 
written, as they are arranged by Connybeare and 
Howson, and by Wordsworth, than as they stand in the 
common editions of the Testament. 

It is the general object of the epistle to point out 
to both Jewish and Gentile Christians the peculiar mis- 
takes to which they were each liable, in consequence 
of prejudices of education, position and habits, and to 
lay open before them the true theory and practice of 
the Christian religion. After a general introduction, 
i. 1-15, he makes a statement of his subject, namely, 
that the Gospel of Christ is the power of God to sal- 
vation for both Jew and Gentile, and that entirely 
through the justification and righteousness which is by 
faith (i. 16, 17). That such a method of salvation is 
needed by the Gentiles is plain from their well known 
and enormous wickedness (i. 18-42.) That the Jews 
also equally need the same method of salvation m plain, 



340 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

because, though they have higher knowledge and bet- 
ter principles than the Gentiles, their character is 
equally bad if not worse ; and God judges of men ex- 
actly by what they are and what they do, and not by 
what they have and what they profess, ii : 1-29. He 
then answers some objections to this statement, which 
might arise in the Jewish mind in consequence of the 
covenant relation of the Jewish nation to God, and 
the promises made to the fathers, iii: 1-20. He then 
sets forth the nature of that justification by faith, 
which is the basis of his instructions, iii: 21-31. He 
next insists that this method of justification is not new 
or peculiar to the Gospel, that Abraham himself was 
justified by faith, iv : 1-4, that David also distinctly 
recognizes the doctrine, iv: 6-8, that Abraham re- 
ceived justification by faith before he was circumcised 
iv: 9-12, and before the law was given iv: 13-15, 
therefore the Jews who have both circumcision and the 
law, cannot be justified unless they have Abraham's 
faith also, and the Gentiles, who have neither circum- 
cision nor the law, may be justified without either if 
they but have the faith of Abraham, iv: 16, 17, and 
then follows an exhibition of the nature and strength 
of Abraham's faith, iv: 18, 22, and an application of 
the whole to the subject in hand, iv: 23-25. Next 
the advantages of this justification by faith, peace with 
God and confidence in his love, v: 1-11 ; and a con- 
trast between what we have lost by Adam and what 
we may gain by Christ, showing the latter to be im- 
measurably the greater, v: 12-21. 

Thus far the subject of justification, — now comes 
that of sanctification. This doctrine of justification 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL. 341 

does not give license to sin, for 1st the very nature of 
our relation to Christ forbids us to sin, vi : 1, 14 ; 2d, 
the different wages of the two services, sin and righ- 
teousness, should bring us entirely into the service of 
the latter, vi : 15, 23 ; and 3d, being now dead to the 
law and united to Christ, instead of our old ineffectual 
struggle against sin, we have in Christ an inward prin- 
ciple of love which leads to a willing obedience, vii : 
1, 6. Further to illustrate the same topic, he takes 
the most favorable case which can possibly arise under 
the law, that of a man approving and loving the law 
and sincerely desiring to become holy by it, but with- 
out Christ living in a fruitless struggle and baffled in 
every endeavor, vii : 7-25. In Christ and Christ alone 
sin is overcome and sanctification attained, viii: 1-17. 
So far then from the doctrine of justification by faith 
giving license to sin, it is the only principle which can 
possibly lead men to holiness. There is the laivless 
state of men, vii: 9 ; the legal state, vii: 5, vii: 7-25, 
and the glorious spiritual state, vii: 6, viii: 1-17, and 
this last is obtained by the Gospel and the Gospel 
only ; and the fundamental principle of the Gospel is 
justification by faith alone, apart from the deeds of the 
law, iii : 20, 28. 

The glorious consummation of the completed work 
of redemption, extending as widely as the ruins of the 
fall have extended, is then described, viii: 18-39. 
But if the preceding be true, many of the descend- 
ants of Abraham fall out of their covenant relations 
with God. He admits it ix : 1-5, but afiirms that this 
is nothing new, ix : 6, 7, the same has happened often 
before as he shows in the case of Ishmael ix : 8, 9, and 



342 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Esauix: 10,13. God confers special favors, accord- 
ing to his own sovereign will, as lie shows in the case 
of Moses ix: 14-16, and chooses his own time and 
manner of punishing transgressors, as he shows in the 
case of Pharaoh ix : 17; in all such matters he acts 
entirely as a sovereign, and with entire justice and 
mercy ix: 18-24; and moreover the ancient Hebrew 
prophets had themselves expressly predicted that the 
time would come when many Gentiles and compara- 
tively few Jews would be in covenant relation with 
God, ix; 25-33. The cause of all this is entirely the 
unbelief of the Jews and nothing else, x: 1-13, and 
their inexcusable unbelief, for they had had abundant 
opportunity both to hear and accept the Gospel, x : 
14-18, as Moses and Isaiah had before announced 
would be the case, x: 19-21. But the time would 
come when Israel would repent and be restored to all 
his covenant privileges, xi : 1-1 6 ; the Gentiles, there- 
fore, were not to boast, or despise the Jews, but to be 
humble and loving, xi : 17-32 ; and then he breaks forth 
into a rapturous strain of praise to God for his marvel- 
lous wisdom and goodness, xi: 33-36. Thus closes 
the dogmatic part of this most wonderful epistle, and 
then follows the practical or hortatory part, xii. — xv. 
and the eminently social and sociable conclusion, xvi. 

STYLE OF THE EPISTLE. 

The style of Paul is altogether peculiar. Nothing 
like it, I believe, can be found out of the New Testa- 
ment. It is the style of a Jewish Rabbi rather than 
of a classical Greek writer ; but of a Rabbi of a very 
peculiar cast of character. His style is the natural 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL. 343 

outgrowth of these elements, to wit, the firey impetu- 
osity of his own nature, his thorough and strictly 
Jewish education, and the characteristic pecularities of 
the Christian theology which he inculcated. All the 
characteristics of his style culminate in the epistle to 
the Romans. He cannot be called a perspicuous writer, 
but he is never equivocal. He is either understood or 
not understood — seldom, by the careful student, who 
analyses his own thoughts, misunderstood. He abounds 
in imperfect parentheses, that is, sentences which in- 
terupt the flow of thought, and yet are so essential to 
the subsequent argument that they cannot be omitted; 
and he is full of those rhetorical irregularities which 
the Greeks designate by the hard names of anantopod- 
oton and anakoloutlion. He frequently uses an imper- 
fect kind of antithesis, a sort of philological equation, 
of which the two sides are not always by any means 
equal as they stand, and the equalizing must be made 
by the reader, guided by the purpose and context of 
the sentences. He so isolates himself in a particular 
topic on hand, that often he states universally that 
which is true only with limitations ; and he uses prep- 
ositions with great profuseness and a wide latitude. 
His mind had been so thoroughly imbued with the 
forms of Hebrew thought, that a knowledge of the 
Hebrew language is almost as essential to the intellL 
gent study of his writings, as a knowledge of the 
Greek. He darts with inconceivable rapidity from • 
thought to thought, so that one must be assiduously 
on the watch to keep him, in sight. He gives himself 
no time to express one thought fully, before he hur- 
ries on to another; and multitudes of ideas are strug- 



344 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE 

gling in his soul for a simultaneous utterance. Yet his 
sentences can be disintegrated and his meaning ascer- 
tained — and when once he is fairly unravelled, his 
thought comes out, not only with perfect explicitness, 
but with warmth the most genial and eloquence un- 
surpassed. No study can be more profitable as a dis- 
ciplinary exercise, whether mental, ethical, or religious, 
than the writings of the apostle Paul. 

The witnesses for the epistle to the Romans are 
Clement of Rome, Ignatius, Polycarp, Justin Martyr, 
Letter to Diognetus, Churches of Yienne and Lyons, 
Irenaeus, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of 
Alexandria, Tetullian, Origin, Eusebius, Jerome, Au- 
gustin. 

Clement of Rome. Hateful to God, not only those 
who do these things, but those who have pleasure in 
them, i: 23. 

Ignatius. c 0f the race of David according to the 
flesh, son of man and son of God,' i: 9. 

Polycarp. l We must all stand before the judgment 
seat of Christ, and each give account of himself. ' xiv : 10. 

Justin Martyr. ' For all have gone out of the way, 
he cries out, they have together become corrupt/ etc., 
iii: 11-17. 

Irenaeus. ' The Apostle Paul writing to the Romans, 
Paul an apostle of Jesus Christ, set apart for the Gos- 
pel of God,' etc., i: 1. 

Again writing to the Romans concerning Israel, he 
says, whose are the fathers, and of whom as to the 
flesh Christ came,' etc., ix: 5. 

Tlieophilus. 'By patient continuance in well doing 
seek for glory, honor and immortality, etc., ii: 6-9. 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL. 345 

And he teaches to render all things to all, honor to 
whom honor, fear to whom fear,' etc., xiii: 7, 8. 

Church of Vienne and Lyons. 'They hastened to 
Christ, showing in reality that the sufferings of this 
time are not to be compared with the glory that shall 
be revealed to us.' viii: 18, 

Clement of Alexandria. ' Behold says Paul the good- 
ness and severity of God.' xi: 22. 'Likewise also 
Paul in the epistle to the Romans writes, we who are 
dead to sin, how shall we live any longer in it ?' vi : 2. 

Tertullian. ' But I shall be able to call Christ alone 
God, as the same apostle says, Of whom Christ, who 
is God over all blessed forever.' ix: 4. 'Writing to 
the Romans, Gentiles by nature doing the things which 
are of the law.' ii: 14. 'As also Paul says to the 
Romans, and not only so, but we glory in tribulations 
also,' etc. v: 3-5. 

Athenagoras. 'Why should I care for sacrifices and 
holocausts of which God has no need ? He requires 
bloodless victims and a reasonable service.' Rom. xii: 
1, Legat. p. 13. 

Theophilus. ' Upon them will come indignation and 
wrath, tribulation and anguish.' (Rom. ii» 6). ad Au- 
tol., p. 79. 

'Divine wisdom requires that we should render to 
all their dues, honor to whom honor, fear to whom 
fear, tribute to whom tribute ; and that we should owe 
no man anything, but to love one another.' (Rom. xiii: 
7, 8). ad Autol, p. 126. 

Clement of Alexandria. 'Behold therefore, says 
Paul, the goodness and severity of God ; on those who 
fall severity, but to thee goodness, if thou continue in 



346 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Iiis goodness, that is, faith toward Christ' (Rom. xi: 
22). Paed., p. 117. 

'Likewise also Paul in his epistle to the Eomans 
writes : How shall we who are dead to sin, live any 
longer therein ? Seeing that our old man is crucified, 
that the body of sin may by destroyed, nei- 
ther yield ye your members the instruments of un- 
righteousness to iniquity.' (Rom. vi: 2, 13). Strom, in. 

Tetullian. ' As also Paul to the Romans, saying the 
Gentiles by nature do the things of the law.' (Rom. ii: 
14. de Coron., 2, 6). 

' As also to the Romans Paul says, And not only so, 
but we glory in tribulation also, knowing that tribulu- 
lation worketh patience, and patience experience, and 
experience hope, and hope maketh not ashamed.' 
(Rom. v: 3-9). Scorpi., 2, 13. 

Eusebius. 'The epistles of Paul are fourteen, all 
well known and beyond doubt.' 

' The same apostle in the addresses at the close of 
the epistle to the Romans (xvi : 14), has among others 
made mention also of Hernias,' etc. 

Athenagoras. 'Why sacrifice to me, of which God 
has no need ? It is needful to offer the bloodless vic- 
tim, and to bring forward the reasonable service? xii: 1. 

Tatian. ' This God we know from his acts, and ac- 
knowledge the invisible things of his power from what 
he has made.' i: 20. 

No book was ever better attested by unimpeachable 
witnesses, than Paul's epistle to the Romans. 

The testimony is so constant, uninterrupted, abun- 
dant 'and undisputed, that there scarcely seems a neces- 
sity for quoting more. 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL. 347 

For the remaining epistles of Paul, my principal 
guides and authorities are Guericke and DeWette, the 
supernaturalist and the rationalist. These two appear 
to me to have written, each from h s own particular 
point of view, the most accurate and complete intro- 
ductions to these epistles, that have yet been pub- 
lished. De Wette is by no means an extreme ration- 
alist. He had no sympathy whatever with the ex- 
travagancies of Strauss, and had a real reverence for 
the Scriptures and for the Lord Jesus. He was rather 
a favorite author of the late Theodore Parker, who 
translated into English and published his Introduction 
to the Old Testament, Guericke is an old-fashioned 
orthodox Lutheran of the most unexceptionable type. 

EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS, FIRST AND SECOND. 

Paul came to Corinth on his second missionary jour- 
ney, in the year 53 or 54, and remained there a year 
and a half. It was a rich commercial city, specially 
devoted to the worship of Venus, corrupt and luxu- 
rious to a high degree even for a pagan city, yet dis- 
tinguished also for learning and eloquence. The pro- 
consul Gallio was quite indifferent to the movements 
of Paul, who supporting himself by tent-making in the 
establishment of Priscilla and Aquila, zealously preach- 
ed the Gospel with much opposition and disturbance, 
but also with great success. Acts xviii: 1-18. While 
Paul was on his missionary journey through Phrygia 
and Galatia, Apollos, a learned and eloquent Jew of 
Alexandria, who had been instructed by Priscilla and 
Aquila at Ephesus, (Acts xviii: 24-28), preached with 
great acceptance at Corinth; and at the same time 



348 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Judaizing teachers from Jerusalem were there, who 
manifested bitter hostility to Paul and caused dissen- 
sions in the church (Acts xviii. 24-28, 1 Cor. ix. 2, 
2 Cor. iii. 1, v. 12, xi. 4, 18, 22, xii. 11). To these troub- 
les were added painful cases of immorality, occasioned 
by the gross corruptions of paganism still adhering to 
the recent Christian converts (1 Cor. v. 9.) 

Such was the state of things at Corinth when Paul 
came to Ephesus from Galatia in the year 56. He re- 
ceived information of the unhappy circumstances by 
persons from the family of Chloe (1 Cor. i. 11), and 
also by others sent specially to him by the Corinthians 
(1 Cor. xvi. 17 ff.). He accordingly sent Timothy to 
them (1 Cor. iv. 17), and afterwards this letter, appro- 
priate not only to the Corinthians, but designed also 
(as was also the second letter) for all Christians in like 
circumstances (1 Cor. i. 2; 2 Cor. i. 1). He first re- 
proves them for their dissensions, then rebukes their 
immoralities and want of discipline, and afterwards 
corrects their false doctrines especially in regard to the 
resurrection. 

From Ephesus Paul passed into Macedonia, learned 
something of the effect produced by his first letter 
from Titus (1 Cor. ii. 12, vii. v. 5-10), and then wrote 
his second letter to correct and deepen the impressions 
produced by the first. Both the letters are of a 
miscellaneous character, not admitting of the rigid sys- 
tematic analysis which can with so much advantage be 
applied to the epistle to the Romans ; but they are won- 
derfully eloquent, full of the most tender Christian 
feeling and practical wisdom, and admirably adapted 
to the instruction of Christian churches in all ages and 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL 349 

nations, and especially to vindicate his own claims to 
the genuine apostleship, which it would seem his ene- 
mies had called in question. 

We may, however, give the following analysis (De 
Wette, p. 205) of the course of thought. 

1. Opposition to the formation of parties in the 
church and a defence of his own simple method of 
preaching the Gospel (i.-iv.). 2. Opposition to the 
improper connection of one of the members of the 
church with his step-mother, and warnings against 
licentious indulgence (v.). 3. Against Christians go- 
ing to law with their fellow Christians before the pagan 
courts, and more warnings against licentiousness (vi). 

4. Answer to the question respecting celibacy (vii.). 

5. Instructions as to the proper course to be pursued 
by Christians in regard to heathen sacrifices, and a 
statement of his own principles and conduct in such 
matters (viii.-xi.). 6. Reproof of some unbecoming 
practices in the church in regard to the presence of 
females at worship with their heads unveiled., and of 
great disorders at the celebration of the Lord's sup- 
per (xi.). 7. Instructions in respect to spiritual gifts, and 
the paramount obligations of Christian love (xii.-xiv.). 

8. The doctrine of the resurrection of the dead (xv.). 

9. Directions in respect to almsgiving, and closing 
salutations (xvi.). 

When Paul wrote the second epistle to the Corin- 
thians he had already escaped from the dangers at 
Ephesus (2 Cor. i. 2 ; Acts xix. 23), and was now in 
Macedonia in company with Timothy (2 Cor. i. 1, 2, ii. 
13, vii. 5, ix. 2 ; Acts, xx. 1) ; and there could have 
been but a short time between the writing of the first 



350 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

epistle and the second. This second epistle was prob- 
ably written in Macedonia near the close of A. D. 58, 
or the beginning of 59. It was occasioned by the 
extreme anxiety which the apostle felt in . regard to 
the effect which might have been produced by his first 
epistle (2 Cor. ii. 4, vii. 5 ff.). The influence had been 
for the most part good (2 Cor. ii. 6-11, vii. 8-13, ix. 2.), 
but the object of the writer had not yet been fully ac- 
complished (2 Cor. vi. 14-18, xii, 20, 21, xiii. 11) ; his 
adversaries had even taken occasion from it to speak 
of him with contempt (2 Cor. i. 15-17, iii. 1, x 9 ff.), 
so that he is obliged to warn them of severer measures 
which he will take if necessary. He also exhorts them 
to make a collection for the poor. Titus with two 
brethren is sent to take charge of the collection and 
the delivery of the epistle (2 Cor. viii. 6-23, ix. 
3-5) ; and the apostle himself proposes soon to follow 
(2 Cor. ix. 4, x. 11, xiii. 1), which he afterwards did 
(Acts xx. 2). 

The epistle is naturally divided into 3 parts. 1. The 
expression of his anxieties occasioned by the troubles 
at Ephesus, and the intelligence he had received from 
Corinth (i.-vii.). 2. Directions in regard to the col- 
lections to be made for the poor saints at Jerusalem 
(viii.-ix.). 3. Earnest exhortations and warnings, and 
the necessary vindication of himself (x.-xiii.). 

The witnesses for these two epistles are Clement of 
Rome, Hermas, Ignatius, Polycarp, the church at Smyr- 
na, Justin Martyr, Letter to Diognetus, Irenaeus, Tatian, 
Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria, Ter- 
tullian, Origen, Jerome, Augustin, etc. The testimony 
is remarkably full and complete, and very few have 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL. 351 

ever pretended to impeach either the external or 
the internal evidence of the genuineness of these 
epistles. 

Clement of Rome, writing to the same Corinthians, 
says, u Take the epistle of the blessed apostle Paul. 
Certainly in the Spirit he sent letters to you, concern- 
ing himself and Cephas and Apollos because you were 
then at disagreement." 1 Cor. i. 11-13. "Let us con- 
sider, beloved, how the Lord demonstrates to us per- 
petually the future resurrection, of which he made the 
Lord Jesus Christ the first fruits when he raised him 
from the dead." 

Poly carp. " Know we not that the saints will judge 
the world? So Paul teaches." 1 Cor. vi. 2. 

Irenaeus. "And this the apostle in the epistle which 
is to the Corinthians most plainly shows, saying, I 
would not that ye should be ignorant, brethren, that 
all our fathers were under the cloud." 1 Cor. x. 1 ff. 
"But what they say, Paul has openly said in the sec- 
ond to the Corinthians, in whom the god of this world 
hath blinded the minds of them that believe not." 
2 Cor. iv. 4. 

Atlienagoras. " This corruptible and dissipated moist 
put on incorruption." 1 Cor. xv. 54 "Each one will 
receive a just sentence, according to what he hath 
done in the body, whether it be good or bad." 2 Cor. 
v. 10. 

Letter to Diognetus. " The apostle says, knowledge 
puffeth up but charity edifieth." 1 Cor. iii. 1. 

Clement of Alexandria. " The blessed Paul in the 
first epistle to the Corinthians, . . . writing, Brethren, 
be not children in understanding." etc. 1 Cor. xiv. 20. 



352 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

" The apostle said in the second to the Corinthians, for 
to this day the same veil remains in the reading of the 
Old Testament." 2 Cor. iii. 14. 

Tertallian. "Paul in the first to the Corinthians 
mentions the deniers and doubters of the resur- 
rection." 

The references are so full and explicit, that it can 
not be deemed necessary to multiply quotations. We 
add a few which refer more particularly to the second 
epistle. 

Poly carp, ad Philip, c. 2. " He that raised up Jesus 
from the dead, will raise us up also if we do his will." 
2 Cor. iv. 14, also ii. 6. Providing for things honest 
both in the sight of God and man." 2 Cor. iv. 14, 
also ii. 4. u Let us arm ourselves with the weapons 
of righteousness." 2 Cor. vi. 7. 

Clement of Borne. Ep. i. ad Cor. c. 30. " Let our 
praise be from God and not from ourselves." 2 Cor. x. 
17, 18, also, c. 5. "Through zeal Paul received the 
reward of endurance, when he was many times in 
chains, was beaten, was stoned," etc. 2 Cor. xi. 24. 

Irenaeus, Haer, iii. 7. " Paul openly spake in 
the second to the Corinthians, in whom the god of this 
world hath blinded the minds of them that believe 
not." 2 Cor. iv. 4, also iv. 28. "For also the apostle 
says in the second epistle to the Corinthians, ' For we 
are unto God a sweet savor of Christ, both in them 
that are saved and in them that perish ; to some in- 
deed a savor of death unto death, to some a savor of 
life unto life.'" 2 Cor. ii. 15, 16. 

Theophilus, ad Autol. iii. "You suffer fools gladly 
when you are wise." 2 Cor. xi. 19. 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL. 353 

Clement of Alexandria. Strom, iv. " The apostle 
speaks of the savor of knowledge in the second epistle 
to the Corinthians." 2 Cor. ii. 14. 

Tertullian. De Pud. c. 13. " They really suppose 
that Paul in the second epistle to the Corinthians gives 
pardon to the same fornicator, whom in his first epistle 
he had directed to be delivered to Satan for the de- 
struction of the flesh." 2 Cor. ii. 6-11. 

Epistle to Diognetus. "They are in the flesh but 
live not according to the flesh." " They are poor, yet 
make many rich." "They have nothing, yet they 
abound in all things." "They are cursed and they 
bless." " They are spitefully treated and they honor." 
"Doing good, they are punished as evil." "When 
they are punished they rejoice as those who are made 
alive," 2 Cor. x. 3-10 

EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS. 

Galatia or Gallogra-cia was a small territory of Asia 
Minor, bounded by Paphlagonia, Cappadocia, Bithynia, 
Phrygia and Lycaonia. It was occupied by Celtic or 
German emigrants about the year 250 B. C, and 
Jerome informs us that they retained in some measure 
their German speech to a very late period. It was 
subjugated by the Romans in the year 188 B. C, and 
became a Roman province in the year 26. There 
were Jews in the province, especially in the commer- 
cial cities, where they had enjoyed the special protec- 
tion of the emperor Augustus. 

Paul was the founder of the churches there (Gal. i. 
3, iv. 13, 19). He made two missionary journeys 
23 



354 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

among the Galatians (Acts xvi. 6, xviii. 23). They 
were a strong, rough, impulsive people, and the 
churches consisted mainly, though not entirely, of Gen- 
tiles (Gal. iv. 8, v. 2, vi. 12). 

After Paul's departure Judaizing teachers had come 
among the Galatians (Acts xv. i. 5, Gal. ii. 12), who un- 
derrated the character and labors of Paul (i. 1, 11), dis- 
puted his doctrine and insisted upon the necessity of 
circumcision and a compliance with the Jewish laws 
(Gal. v. 2 ff. 11 ff), so that the people were very much 
disturbed and misled (Gal. i. 6, iii. 1, iv. 9-21, v. 3 ff ). 
It was these disturbances and perversions which gave 
occasion to Paul's epistle. The epistle was written 
either at Troy or Corinth (Acts xvi. 3, xviii. 11), the 
time not quite certain, but about the year 55 or 56 
after Christ. Contrary to his usual custom he wrote 
the epistle with his own hand without the assistance 
of an amanuensis (Gal. vi. 11). 

The epistle may be arranged in two divisions. 
1. The apostle's assertion of his own authority and 
dignity as a teacher of Christianity (i. ii.). 2. A denial 
of the necessity of the Mosaic law, and a vindication 
of the glorious freedom of the Gospel (iii. -v.), and an 
exhortation that this freedom should not be abused to 
licentiousness, concluding with ethical precepts and 
warnings (vi.). The genuineness of the epistle has 
never been seriously questioned, and it is perfectly 
well sustained both by internal evidence and external 
testimony. 

Witnesses for Galatians. Clement of Rome, Igna- 
tius, Polycarp, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Tatian, Athe- 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL. 355 

nagoras, Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian, Eusebius, 
Jerome, Augustin. 

Specimens of Testimony. Irenaeus. "And again in 
the epistle which is to the Galatians Paul says, But 
when the fullness of time had come God sent his Son, 
made of a woman, made under the law," etc. Gal. iv. 
4, 5. "But also the apostle Paul saying, For if ye 
served those who were not gods, but now knowing 
God, nay being known by God." Gal. iv. 3, 9. But 
also in that which is to the Galatians, he speaks thus, 
What then is the law of works ? It was added until 
the seed should come," etc. Gal. iii. 19. 

Clement of Alexandria. "Wherefore Paul, also, 
writing to the Galatians says, My little children, of 
whom I travail in birth again till Christ be formed in 

you." 

Tertullian. " We also confess then the principal epis- 
tle against Judaism which teaches the Galatians." 

"But of this no more, if it be the same Paul, who 
also in another place enumerates heresies among the 
works of the flesh, writing to the Galatians." 

Justin Martyr. "Be as I am, for I am as ye are." 
Gal. iv. 12. 

Clement of Rome. " Who gave himself for our sins, 
according to the will of God and our Father." Gal. i. 4. 

Ignatius. "An apostle not of men nor by men, 
but by Jesus Christ and God the Father who raised 
him from the dead." Gal. i. 1. Christ is become of no 
effect unto you, whosoever of you are justified by the 
law." Gal. v. 4. 



356 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE 



THE EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS. 

The relations of the apostle Paul to the church at 
Ephesus were peculiarly tender and interesting. The 
19th and 20th chapters of the book of Acts should be 
carefully read in connection with this epistle. It was 
written while Paul was a prisoner at Rome, about A. 
D. 61 or 62. (See Acts xxviii. 30 31, and Eph. iii. 1, 
iv. 1, vi. 20.) The peculiar circumstances under which 
he wrote and his deep interest in the doctrinal 
purity of that church, as evinced in his address to the 
Ephesian elders assembled at Miletus (Acts xx. 28-32), 
led him to a dogmatic discussion of the peculiar tenets 
of the religion of Christ, more characteristic of this 
epistle, perhaps, than of any other except the epistle 
to the Romans. It naturally .divides itself into two 
parts of three chapters each. In the first part (i., ii., 
iii.), as might be expected, the dogmatic or theological 
element predominates, and in the second (iv. v. vi.), 
the ethical or hortatory. He gives great prominence 
to the doctrine of predestination, and insists with much 
emphasis on the idea that Christ is the sufficient and 
the only Saviour of lost man, and the Saviour equally 
and in the same way of both Jew and Gentile, in this 
respect particularly the letter bearing a strong resem- 
blance to the epistle to the Romans. The epistle abund- 
antly asserts itself to be the composition of Paul, and the 
composition of Paul addressed to the Ephesians (Eph. 
i. 1, iii. 1), and to this both the internal evidence and 
the testimony of the ancients exactly corresponds. 

Witnesses for the Epistle to the Ephesians. Clement of 
Rome, Hermas, Ignatius, Polycarp, Irenaeus, Theophi- 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL. 357 

lus, Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian, Origen, Epiph- 
anius, Augustin, Jerome, Eusebius. 

Specimen of Testimony. Irenaeus. u As the blessed 
Paul says in the epistle to the Ephesians, that we are 
members of his body, of his flesh and of his bones." 
Eph. v. 30. u And this also Paul says, for whatsoever 
doth make manifest is light." Eph. v. 13. 

Poly carp. "As it is said in these Scriptures, Be ye 
angry and sin not. Let not the sun go down upon 
your wrath." Eph. iv. 26. "Knowing that ye are 
saved by grace, not of works." Eph. ii. 8. 

Clement of Alexandria. "Wherefore, writing to 
the Ephesians, he revealed most openly that which 
was sought, speaking in this manner, until we all come 
in the unity of the faith and the knowledge of God, 
unto a perfect man." etc. Eph. iv. 13, 14. "Where- 
fore, also, in the epistle to the Ephesians he writes, 
Be subject one to another in the fear of God." Eph. 
v. 21. 

Tertullian. " Here I pass by concerning the other 
epistle which we have, written to the Ephesians." 
" Indeed in the truth of the church we have that epis- 
tle sent to the Ephesians." 

Origen. " But also the apostle in the epistle to the 
Ephesians, uses the same language when he says, Who 
chose us before the foundation of the world." Eph. i. 4. 

Ignatius. " Let no one of you be found a deserter. 
Let your baptism remain as weapons, faith as a helmet, 
love as a spear, patient continuance as the whole ar- 
mor." Eph. vi. 13, 17. "As being stones of the tern- 
pie of the Father, prepared for the habitation of God 
the Father." Eph. ii. 20-22. 



358 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Hermas. " For it would become you as the servants 
of God to walk in the truth, and not to join an evil 
conscience with the spirit of truth, and not to make 
grief for the true and Holy Spirit of God." iv. 30. 

Clement of Rome. " Why should there be among 
you contentions, wrath, dissensions, schisms and war? 
Have we not one God and one Christ ? And is not 
one spirit of grace poured out upon us? And is 
there not one calling in Christ?" Eph. iv. 4. 

EPISTLE TO THE PHILIPPIANS. 

Philippi was the first city in Europe where Paul 
preached the Gospel and established a Christian church. 
A full account of this important event, of the difficul- 
ties which the apostle encountered, of the success 
which attended his efforts, of the shameful abuses 
which he suffered, and of his dignified assertion 
of his own rights as a Roman citizen, and the tardy 
but ultimately full concession of these rights by the 
magistrates ; and a brief notice of a second visit there, 
is found in Acts xvi. and xx. 2-6. There was a very ten- 
der friendship between the apostle and the Philippian 
Christians ; they had been liberal to him beyond what 
he desired or they could really afford (Phil. iv. 15, 16, 
2 Cor. viii. 1-6) ; and the occasion of his writing the 
epistle was the generosity of his Philippian friends in 
sending Epaphroditus all the way to Eome with sup- 
plies for his wants while he was a prisoner there." 
Phil. iv. 18. It appears to have been written about 
the middle of the year 63 after Christ. 

After an affectionate introduction (i. 1-11), and an 
account of his condition in Rome and the opposition 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL. 359 

lie had encountered from Judaizing teachers (i. 12—26), 
he exhorts them to union and humility (i. 27-ii. 16), 
and gives them information in respect to Timothy 
and the sickness and recovery of Epaphroditus (ii. 
17-30.) He then refers again to the opposition which 
he had encountered from Jewish teachers, and the 
attitude of his own mind in respect to their doctrines 
(hi. 1-21), and concludes with affectionate exhorta- 
tions and salutations (iv.). The epistle affirms itself 
to be the writing of Paul to the Philippians (Phil. i. 1), 
and to this all internal evidence and external testimony 
corresponds. 

Witnesses to Epistle to Philippians. Clement of Rome, 
Ignatius, Polycarp, Letter to Diognetus, Letter of the 
churches of Yienne and Lyons, Irenaeus, Theophilus, 
Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian, Cyprian, Origen, 
Eusebius, Augustin, Jerome. 

Specimen of Testimony. Polycarp (writing to the 
Philippians). " Of Paul . . . who also being absent 
wrote letters to you, into which if ye look intently, ye 
will be able to be built up into the faith given to you." 
" You, among whom the blessed Paul labored, who are 
praised in the beginning of his epistle ; for of you he 
glories in all the churches which alone then knew God." 
Phil. i. 5 ff. 

Irenaeus. u As also Paul says to the Philippians, I 
am full, the things being received from Epaphroditus 
which were sent by you, an odor of sweetness, an ac- 
ceptable sacrifice, well pleasing to God." Phil. iv. 18." 

Clement of Alexandria. "Paul also confessing con- 
cerning himself, not as though I had already attained 
or were already perfect," etc. Phil. iii. 12-14 



360 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Church of Vienne and Lyons. " Who being in the 
form of God thought it not robbery to be equal with 
God." Phil. ii. 6. 

Tertullian. " Paul himself writes to the Philippians, 
If by any means I may attain to the resurrection of 
the dead." etc. Phil. iii. 11 ff. 

Cyprian. "Also Paul to the Philippians, Who being 
in the form of God," etc. Phil. ii. 6-11. 

Clement of Rome. " You see, men beloved, what 
an example is given to us. For if the Lord so hum- 
bled himself, what shall we do who come under the 
yoke of his grace ?" Phil. ii. 5 ff. 

Ignatius. u I exhort you to do nothing by conten- 
tion, but according to the discipline of Christ." Phil, 
ii. 3. 

Irenaeus. " Concerning which resurrection the apos- 
tle, in that which is to the Philippians says, being made 
conformable to his death, if by any means I may attain 
to the resurrection which is from the dead." 

Theophilus. "That indeed now these things are 
true and useful and just and lovely to all men, is very 
plain." Phil. iv. 8. 

EPISTLE TO THE COLOSSIANS; 

Colosse was a city of Asia Minor, near Laodicea 
and Hierapolis, and in the same region with the seven 
churches to which the Apocalypse was directed. Paul 
had not been there personally (Col. ii. 1), though he 
had twice passed through that country (Acts xvi. 6, 
xviii. 23), but there were members of that church who 
were very dear to him (Col. i. 7 ff, Philem) ; and at 
the time of his writing this epistle, about A. D. 61 or 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL. 361 

62, Epaphras, the teacher of the church, was with him 
(Col. iv. 12, Philem. 23) while a prisoner at Rome. 
This visit of Epaphras, and the intelligence which he 
gave to Paul respecting the church at Colosse, afforded 
the occasion of his writing this letter and sending it 
on with the letter to Philemon by Tychichus and One- 
simus (Col. iv. 7-9, Philem. 23). 

After an introduction of thanksgiving and interces- 
sion (i. 1-12), he testifies to the Colossians the exalted 
dignity of the Redeemer and the benefits of the re- 
demption received through him (i. 13-23), and affirms 
that he himself rejoices to suffer for their salvation (i. 
24-29), in order the more effectually to warn them 
against those who by worldly craft would seduce them 
from Christ (ii. 1-15), for it is his chief object in wri- 
ting to this church, for whose love and sympthy he 
felt deeply grateful, to protect them against certain 
false teachers, who combined bigoted adherence to 
certain Jewish principles with severe asceticism and 
high pretensions to superior and mysterious wisdom 
(ii. 16-23). The last half of the epistle is taken up 
with eloquent and earnest exhortations to holiness of 
life (iii., iv.). 

In regard to this epistle also internal evidence and 
external testimony fully agree. 

Witnesses for Epistle to the Colossians. Clement of 
Rome, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Theophilus, Clement 
of Alexandria, Tertullian, Origen, Eusebius, Augustin, 
Jerome. 

Specimen of Testimony. Irenaeus iii. 14. "And 
again in the epistle which is to the Colossians, he (Paul) 
says, Luke the beloved physician saluteth you." Col. 



362 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

iv. 14. " And on this account the apostle in the epis- 
tle which is to the Colossians says, And you that were 
once alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked 
works, yet now hath he reconciled in the body of his 
flesh through his death to present you holy and pure 
and without fault in his sight." Col. i. 21, 2.2. 

Justin Martyr, Dial. c. Try ph. p. 310. "He was 
made flesh from the virgin's womb, the first born of 
all creatures." "Knowing him to be the first begotten 
of God, and also of all creatures." " The first born of 
every creature." Col. i. 15. 

Clement of Rome. " Ye see, beloved, . . . unless 
we walk worthy of him, and do those things which 
are honorable and well pleasing in his sight with all 
the heart." Col. i. 10. 

Theophilus, ad Autol. p. 100. u He begat this word 
the first born of every creature." Col. i. 15. 

Clement of Alexandria, Strom, i. "In the epistle 
to the Colossians, he writes warning every man and 
teaching in all wisdom that we may present every man 
perfect in Christ." Col. i. 28. Strom, vi. : "Likewise 
he speaks to the Colossians who were converted from 
among the Greeks, Beware lest any man spoil you 
through philosophy," etc. Col. ii. 8. 

Tertullian, De Praes. Haer. c. 7. " The apostle wri- 
ting to the Colossians, See lest any one circumvent 
you by philosophy and vain seduction after the tradi- 
tion of men," etc. Col. ii. 8. De Resurrect. Carnis. c. 
23 : " Indeed the apostle writing to the Colossians 
teaches that we were sometime dead, alienated and 
enemies of the Lord in our mind, when we walked in 
wicked works ; thence buried in the baptism of Christ 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL. 363 

with him, and rising again with him by faith of the 
efficacy of God, who raised him from the dead. And 
when ye were dead in sins in the circumcision of your 
flesh, he hath quickened you together with him," etc. 
Col. ii. 11-13. ' 

There can be no need of tracing the quotations down 
any further. The testimony to this book, as to every 
other thus far, is uniform and uncontradicted from the 
beginning to our own day, or at least to the times of 
modern unhistorical criticism. 

EPISTLES TO THE THESSALONIANS 1. AND II. 

Thessalonica, situated on a bay near the site of the 
ancient Therme, was a large and populous commer- 
cial city, the capital of one of the four districts 
into which the Romans divided the country of Mace- 
donia. It received its name from its founder, Thesa- 
lonica, the wife of Cassander. Paul visited the city 
in company with Silas and Timothy, and in a short time 
gained many adherents, especially among the prose- 
lytes to the Jewish religion ; but was soon compelled 
to leave on account of disturbances excited by the 
Jews (Acts xvii. 1-9 ). From thence he went to Beroea, 
and driven also from that city he repaired to Athens, 
leaving his two companions behind with directions to 
follow him speedily (Acts xvii. 10-15). He then went 
to Corinth, where Timothy and Silas rejoined him (Acts 
xviii. 5) ; and at a later period he made another jour- 
ney to Macedonia and probably visited Thessalonica. 
These two are the earliest of Paul's epistles which we 
have, as the first was written as early as A. D. 52 or 
53, and the second soon after, during his residence in 
Corinth (2 Thess. iii. 2, Acts xviii. 12 ff.) 



364 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Full of anxiety for the Thessalonians, he had sent 
Timothy from Athens to inquire after them, and had 
received information by him, (Thess. i. 1 ; ii. 1 7 • ff. 
in. 1-6,) and had twice endeavored himself to return. 
The church was in circumstances of affliction, and need- 
ed encouragement and confirmation and further de- 
velopment, (iii. 2-13) ; though it was strong in the 
faith and alive in love. (iii. 6-9, iv. 10.) They had 
faults for which the apostle had verbally reproved 
them, (iv. 3-6, 11, 12. v. 15,) and were in particular 
need of information in regard to what would be the 
future of those who were already dead at the final 
coming of Christ, (iv. 13 — v. 11.) 

The epistle consists of two parts, to wit : 

1. The expression of the apostle's affection for the 
Thessalonian church, a notice of their circumstances, 
his reception among them, his care for them, and the 
comfort they gave him. i-iii. 

2. Ethical exhortations, comforting assurances in re- 
gard to those who had died, (x.), and exhortations to 
always be ready for death and the coming of Christ, 
with concluding salutations, (v.) 

TESTIMONIES TO I. THESSALONIANS. 

Clement of Rome. 1 Epistle ad Cor. c. 38. We 
ought in every thing to give thanks unto him. 1 Thess. 
v. 18. 

Wherefore let our whole body be preserved in Christ 
Jes-us. 1 Thess. v. 23. 

Ignatius, ad Poly a, 2, 1. Be diligent in increas- 
ing prayers. Thess. v. 17. Ad Ephes. 2, 10. And 
also pray without ceasing for other men. 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL. 365 

Polycarp, ad Philip. 2, 4. Without ceasing inter- 
ceding for all. Ibid. c. 2. Abstaining from all evil, 
(y. 22). 

Irenaeus. Haer., v. 6. And on this account the 
apostle, in the first epistle to the Thessalonians, speak- 
ing thus, May the God of peace sanctify you wholly, 
and may your whole spirit, soul, and body be pre- 
served unto the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ, (v : 
23, v. 30.) This also the apostle says, When they 
shall say peace and safety, then sudden destruction 
cometh upon them. v. 3. 

Clement of Alexandria. Paed. i. p. 88. But this 
also the blessed Paul most plainly signified, saying, 
When we might have been burdensome as the apostles 
of Christ, we were gentle in the midst of you, even as 
a nurse cherisheth her children, ii. 7. 

Strom, i., p. 296. Prove all things, says the apostle, 
and hold fast that which is good. v. 21: 

Tertullian. De Resur. Cam., c. 24. Learn with the 
Thessalonians, for we read, How ye turned from idols 
to serve the living and true God, and to wait for his 
Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, even 
Jesus, i: 7, 10. And in the epistle itself, to the Thes- 
salonians, he suggests, Of the times and the seasons, 
brethren, ye have no need that I write unto you ; for 
yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so 
cometh as a thief in the night, v. 1, 2. 

The second epistle to the Thessalonians was written 
especially to correct a misunderstanding which had 
arisen out of the first. 1 Thess. iv. 1 7. In speaking of 
the day of judgment he had said, Then we who are 
alive and remain, etc. From this some had inferred 



366 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

that he meant to teach that Christ would come to judg- 
ment during the life time of that generation. In 
2 Thess. ii., he positively denies that he entertains any 
such idea, or had given any such instruction. He 
affirms that many important events were to occur be- 
fore the second coming of the Lord, and they might 
occupy a long time. He fixes no time, and inasmuch 
as the time is entirely uncertain, Tie uses the first per- 
son plural, as a convenient indefinite designation of 
Christians, at whatever time they might meet the Lord 
at his coming. So Peter labors very earnestly to show 
the Christians of his time, that without any violation 
of the divine promise, a long time, as men view time, 
might yet intervene before the final coming of the 
Lord, 2 Pet. iii. Whatever might have been the cur- 
rent opinion on this subject, among private Christians, 
the inspired teachers of the New Testament not only 
did not teach the doctrine of the immediate coming of 
the Lord, but they earnestly, emphatically and re- 
peatedly taught the direct contrary. These two 
chapters, 2 Thess. ii., and 2 Pet. iii., are perfectly ex- 
plicit on this point ; and the same idea is sufficiently in- 
dicated in other passages, such as Acts i : 7, John xxi : 
21-23, Markxiii: 32, etc. 

The second epistle to the Thessalonians consists : 

1. Of thanksgivings, prayers and approval of the 
Thessalonians, especially in reference to their praise- 
worthy conduct under suffering. 

2. A^ correction of their mistaken notion that the 
second advent of Christ was immediately to occur, and 
warning them that this event must be preceded by a 
great apostacy, requiring a considerable interval of 
time. 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL. 367 

3. Admonitions and exhortations appropriate to 
their condition ; concluding with a remarkable state- 
ment of the manner in which he authenticated all his 
epistles. 

TESTIMONIALS TO SECOND EPISTLE TO THE THESSALONIANS. 

Poly carp, ad Phil., 2, 11. l Yet esteem not such 
as enemies, but as erring members recall them, that 
ye may save your whole body.' 2 Thess. iii. 15. 
Among whom the blessed Paul labored, who are in 
the beginning of his epistle, of you there is glorying 
in all the churches, which then alone knew God.' 2 
Thess. i. 5. 

Justin Martyr. Dial., p. 336. 'When also the man 
of the apostacy, speaking proud things against the 
Most High, will dare upon the earth lawless things 
against us Christians.' 2 Thess., ii. 3, 4. 

Irenaeus. Haer. v. 7. 'And again, in the sec- 
ond to the Thessalonians, speaking concerning Anti- 
Christ, And then shall that wicked one be revealed, 
whom the Lord Jesus Christ will slay with the spirit of 
his mouth, and the presence of his advent will destroy 
him, whose coming is after the working of Satan, in 
all power of signs and lying wonders.' 2 Thess. ii. 8. 

Ibid. v. 25. Concerning whom the apostle, in the 
epistle which is the second to the Thessalonians, thus 
speaks, Unless there come a falling away first, and the 
man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition, who op- 
poseth and exalteth himself above all that is called 
God, or is worshipped, so that he sits in the temple of 
God, showing himself as if he were God.' 2 Thess. 
ii 3, 4. 



368 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Clement of Alexandria. Strom, v., p. 554. The 
apostle says there is not knowledge in all ; but pray 
ye that we may be delivered from unreasonable and 
wicked men, for all men have not faith.' 2 Thess. iii . 2. 

Tertullian. De Res. Car. ii. 24. ' And in the second 
epistle to the Thessalonians, with a more correct solici- 
tude to the same, But I beseech you, brethren, by the 
coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by our gather- 
ing together unto him, that ye be not soon shaken in 
your mind or troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, 
to wit, of false prophets, nor by epistle, to wit, of false 
apostles, as if by us, as that the day of the Lord is at 
hand.' 2 Thess. ii: 1-3. Scorpi., p. 498. c But Paul 
the apostle, concerning the first persecutor, who first 
shed the blood of the church, and afterwards changing 

the sword for the pen says, so that 

we ourselves may glory in you in the churches of God, 
for your patience and faith in all your persecutions and 
tribulations which ye endure, a token of the righteous 
judgment of God, that ye may be counted worthy of 
His kingdom, for which ye also suffer. 7 2 Thess. 
i. 4, 5. 

THE FIRST EPISTLE TO TIMOTHY. 

The two epistles to Timothy and the epistle to Titus 
are called pastoral epistles, because in them Paul gives 
directions to these two helpers of his, as to how they 
should conduct themselves as the shepherds and the 
patterns of the flock over which they were placed. 
Timothy was a native of the city of Lystra in Lycaonia 
in Asia Minor, the son of a Greek father and Jewish 
mother. He was received into the church by Paul, be- 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL. 369 

came his companion and fellow-laborer in Macedonia and 
Achaia and was his fellow-prisoner at Rome. Acts 
xvi-xx. 

It is not easy to determine the precise date of the 
first epistle to Timothy, nor is this necessary to an un- 
derstanding of its contents or the establishment of its 
genuineness. It is quite probable that it was written 
from Macedonia, about A. D. 63 or 64, and not im- 
possible that it might have been written from Laodicea, 
according to the old superscription. 

Paul had departed from Ephesus for the purpose of 
going to Macedonia, with the intention of speedily re- 
turning ; and leaving Timothy meanwhile in charge of 
the Ephesian church, writes to him these directions, 
(1 Tim. i. 3, iii. 13.) The epistle begins with per- 
sonal reminiscencies and affectionate talk with Timo- 
thy, (i.) proceeds to instructions in regard to public 
worship, (ii.) and the qualifications of church officers, 
(iii.) He then foretells the coming in of false teach- 
ers and various corruptions, and instructs Timothy in 
regard to the course he was to pursue when he had 
these difficulties to encounter, and concludes as usual 
with the grace be with thee, iv-vi. 

TESTIMONIALS TO THE FIRST EPISTLE TO TIMOTHY. 

Poly carp, ad Philip. 2, 12. u Pray for all the saints, 
pray also for kings and princes and all that are in au- 
thority." 1 Tim. ii. 1, 2. 

Ibid. 2, 4. u The love of money is the beginning 
of all evils. But knowing that we brought nothing 
into this world and can carry nothing out, let us arm 
ourselves with the weapons of righteousness." 1 Tim. 
vi. 7, 10. ^ 



370 BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Epistle to Diognetus. "Being reckoned faithful by 
Him they knew the mysteries of the Father. On which 
account he sent the Word that He might appear to the 
world ; who was despised by the people, preached by 
apostles, believed on by the Gentiles." 1 Tim. iii : 16,' 

Epistle of the Churches at Vienne and Lyons. 
"But overwhelmingly their whole fury fell upon 
Attalus, a native of Pergamus, who had always been the 
pillar and stay of the faithful there." 1 Tim. iii : 15, 
compare Rev. iii: 12. 

"Alcibiades, one of the martyrs, led a squalid and 
ascetic life, accepting no food but bread and water 
only up to that time. When he was put in prison he 
wished to retain the same mode of living ; but after 
the first conflict in the amphitheatre it was revealed to 
Attalus that Alcibiades was not doing right, and set 
an evil example for others, in that he did not use the 
creatures of God. And Alcibiades being persuaded 
then began to use all kinds of food promiscuously and 
gave thanks to God." 1 Tim. iv. 3, 4. 

Irenaeus. Haer. i: 1. "And some opposing the 
truth bring in false words and vain genealogies, 
which, as the apostle says, minister questions rather 
than godly edifying which is in faith." 1 Tim. i. 4. 

Ihid. ii. 4. " And well Paul say s, novelties of words 
of false science. 1 Tim. vi. 20. 

Athenagoras. Legat. pro Christ, p. 15. "For God 
is all things to himself, light inaccessible, universe per- 
fect, spirit, power, word." 1 Tim. vi. 16. 

Theophilus.' Ad Autol. iii. " And also that we should 
be subject to magistrates and powers, and pray for 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL. 371 

them, our divine word commands in order that we may- 
lead a quiet and peaceable life." 1 Tim. ii. 1, 2, see 
Tit. iii. 1. 

Clement of Alexandria. Strom, ii., p. 383. " Con- 
cerning which the apostle writing says, 0, Timothy, 
keep that which is committed to thee, avoiding profane 
novelties of words and oppositions of science falsely 
so called, which some professing have erred concern- 
ing the faith. By this word are those heretics re- 
proved who set aside the epistle to Timothy." 1 Tim. 
vi: 20, 21. 

Ibid. ii. p. 464. " Whence also the apostle, I will 
says he that the younger women marry, bear children, 
guide the house, give none occasion to the adversary 
to speak reproachfully, for some are already turned 
aside to Satan." 1 Tim. v. 14, 15. 

Admon. ad Gent. "Godliness is profitable to all 
things, says Paul, having the promise of the present 
life and of the future." 1 Tim. iv. 8. 

Tertullian. De Praescr. Haer. 2, 25. "And Paul 
to Timothy uses this word, Timothy keep that which 
is committed to thee." 1 Tim. vi. 20. 

De Pudicit. 2, 13. "Plainly the same apostle deliv- 
ers to Satan Hymenaeus and Alexander that they may 
learn not to blaspheme, as he writes to Timothy." 
1 Tim. i. 20. 

Jerome. Comment, in Epist. Tit. "Speaking of 
Marcion and Basilides and all heretics, Jerome says, 
that rejecting gospels and epistles he wonders how 
they dare assume to themselves the Christian name, for, 
to be silent concerning other epistles, from which they 
erase whatever they see contrary to their own dogmas, 



372 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

"they reject some entire epistles, as Timothy, Hebrews, 
Titus, which we are now undertaking to explain. In- 
deed if they gave any reasons why they suppose these 
epistles not to be the apostle's, we should endeavor to 
reply and perhaps satisfy the reader. But now they 
pronounce with heretic authority, and say, this epistle 
is Paul's, and this is not." 

THE SECOND EPISTLE TO TIMOTHY. 

This epistle Paul writes from Rome, where he is im- 
prisoned, inviting Timothy, who is at Ephesus, to come 
to him and bring Mark with him (2 Tim. i. 8, 12, 16, 
iv. 5, 9, 11, 16, 19, 21). The date of it is shortly be- 
fore the apostle's martyrdom, probably A. D. 65 or 6Q. 

He expresses his affection for Timothy, and calls to 
mind various interesting personal incidents (i.), ex- 
horts to purity of life and fortitude under affliction (ii), 
warns of corruptions and false teachers, and expresses 
his own calmness and happiness in view of his ap- 
proaching martyrdom (iv.). 

Testimonies to the Second Epistle to Timothy. Bar- 
nabas, Epis. 7. "If the Son of God, who is the Lord, 
and will judge the quick and dead, suffered," etc. 
2 Tim. iv. 1. 

Ignatius, ad Ephes. ii. 2. "But also Crocus, who is 
worthy of God and of you, whom I received as a 
proof of your love, refreshed me in all things ; and in 
like manner will the Father of Jesus Christ refresh 
him." 2 Tim. i. 16, 18. "You have refreshed me in 
all things as Jesus Christ refreshed you. You have 
loved me both absent and present ; The Lord will re- 
ward you." 2 Tim. i. 16, 18. Ad Polyc. c. 6 : " Please 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL. 373 

Him for whom you are soldiers, and from whom you 
receive wages." 2 Tim. ii. 4. 

Poly carp, Ep. ad Philip. a As He hath promised us 
that He will raise us from the dead, and that, if we 
walk worthy of Him we shall reign with Him, provided 
that we believe." 2 Tim. ii. 11, 12. 

Irenaeus, Haer, iii. 3. " The blessed apostle, 
therefore, founding and building up the church gave 
over the pastorship to Linus for the administering of 
the church. Of this Linus Paul makes mention in his 
epistles which are to Timothy." 2 Tim. iv. 21. Ibid, 
v. 20: " Ever learning and never finding the truth." 
2 Tim. iii. 7. 

Clement of Alexandria, Strom, iii. p. 448. u For 
we know what the most excellent Paul teaches respect- 
ing women deacons in his second epistle to Timothy." 
Ibid, i. p. 270: "Thou therefore be strong, also says 
Paul, in the grace which is in Christ Jesus, and what 
thou hast heard from me among many witnesses, the 
same commit thou to faithful men who shall be able to 
teach others also. And again, Study to show thyself 
approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to 
be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth." 
2 Tim. ii. 1, 2, 15. Admon. ad Gentil. p. 56: "The 
apostle knowing this teaching to be really divine says, 
Thou, Timothy, from a child hast known the sacred 
Scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto sal- 
vation through faith in Christ." 2 Tim. iii. 15. 

Tertullian, Scorpiac. c. 13. "You see how he de- 
scribes the felicity of martyrdom, .... Exulting he 
writes to Timothy, For I am now ready to be offered 
and the time of my departure is at hand. I have 



374 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

fought the good fight, I have finished my course, I 
have kept the faith, there remains for me a crown 
which the Lord will give me in that day." 2 Tim. 
iv. 6-8. 

Origen, Comment, in Matt. iii. p. 916. u Also what 
he says as Jannes and Mambres withstood Moses ; this 
is not found in the public Scriptures, but in a secret 
book which is entitled, The Book of Jannes and Mam- 
bres." 1 Tim. iii. 8. 

Eusebius, E. H. iii. 4. " Linus whom he (Paul) has 
mentioned in his second epistle to Timothy." H. E. 
ii. 22 : " While he (Paul) was a prisoner at Rome, he 
wrote his second epistle to Timothy in which he both 
mentions his first defence and his impending death. 
Hear on these points his own testimony respecting 
himself. In my former defence no one was present 
with me but all deserted me. May it not be laid to 
their charge. But the Lord was with me and strength- 
ened me, that through me the preaching of the Gospel 
might be fulfilled and all the nations might hear it. 
And I was rescued out of the lion's mouth.' He plainly 
intimates in these words, ' On the former occasion he 
was rescued from the lion's mouth, that the preaching 
of the Gospel might be accomplished,' that it was 
Nero to whom he referred by this expression, as is 
probable on account of his cruelty. Therefore he did 
not subsequently subjoin any such expressions as 'he 
will rescue me from the lion's mouth,' for he saw in 
spirit how near his approaching death was. Hence 
after the expression, ' I was rescued from the lion's 
mouth,' this also, 'the Lord will rescue me from every 
evil work, and will save me unto his heavenly king- 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL. 375 

dom,' indicating the martyrdom that he would soon 
suffer ; which he more clearly expressed in the same 
epistle, ' for I am already poured out, and the time of 
my departure is at hand.' And indeed in this second 
epistle to Timothy, he shows that Luke alone was with 
him when he wrote, but at his former defence not even 
he." 2 Tim. iv. 16, 18, vi. 8, 11. 

We see in all these testimonies, when the witnesses 
quote passages at large, that their New Testament 
books not only had the same names which we now 
have, but precisely the same contents, the ancient and 
the modern being identical throughout. 

EPISTLE TO TITUS. 

Titus, a Greek by birth, was an assistant of the apos- 
tle Paul, was with him on his journey to Jerusalem 
(Gal. i. 1-3) ; fulfilled commissions for him in Corinth 
(2 Cor. vii. 6-4, viii. 6-23, xii. 18), and was now left 
in Crete to attend to ecclesiastical duties in that island 
(Tit. i. 5 ff.). The object of this epistle is to give 
him instructions in respect to the discharge of those 
duties. 

1. Instructions in regard to the appointment of 
elders and the treatment of false teachers (i.). 2. The 
guiding of the congregation in reference to the differ- 
ent ranks in society (ii.). 3. Ethical principles of a 
general character, warning in regard to controversies, 
and personal notices (iii. ). 

The epistle was probably written between the first 
and the second epistle to Timothy. 

Testimonies to Titus. Clement of Rome, First Epis- 
tle to Cor. ii. 2. "Be ready to every good work." 
Tit. iii. 1. 



376 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Ignatius, ad Trail, c. 3. " Whose very behaviour 
(habit) (KaracTT^a) is a great discipline." Tit. ii. 3, is the 
only passage in the New Testament where this Greek 
word occurs. 

Irenaeus, Haer. iii. 3. "As the blessed Paul also 
says, A man that is a heretic after the first and second 
admonition, reject ; knowing that he who is such is 
perverted and condemned of himself." Tit. iii. 10, 11, 
v. 15. "Jesus said to him, Go to Siloam and wash, 
at the same time restoring to him the clay ointment 
(plasmationem), and that which is the regeneration by 
washing." Tit. iii. 5. i. 16: ."As many as stand off 
from the church and give heed to these old wives' 
fables are truly condemned of themselves, whom the 
apostle Paul commands us after the first and second 
admonition to reject." Tit. iii. 10, 11. 

Theojphilus, ad Autol. iii. p. 122. " But we have a 
lawgiver who is truly God, who teaches us to live a 
righteous, godly and honorable life." Tit. ii. 11, 12. 
ii. p. 95 : "Men about to receive repentance and re- 
mission of sins all come to the truth by water and the 
washing of regeneration, and being regenerated receive 
blessing from God." Tit. iii. 5. 6. 

Clement of Alexandria, Strom, i. p. 299. "Epimeni- 
des, a Cretan, a Greek prophet whom Paul knew, of 
whom he makes mention in the epistle to Titus, speak- 
ing thus, One of themselves, even a prophet of their 
own, said, the Cretans are always liars, evil beasts, 
slow bellies." Tit. i. 12. Admon. ad Gent. p. 6 : " But 
now, as the divine apostle of the Lord said, The grace 
of God which bringeth salvation hath appeared unto 
all men, teaching us that denying ungodliness and 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL. 377 

worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously and 
godly in the world, looking for that blessed hope, even 
the glorious appearing of the great God and our 
Saviour Jesus Christ." Tit. ii. 11-13. 

Tertullian, De. Praes. Haer. "And Paul 

suggests that a man who is a heretic should be rejected 
after the first admonition, because that such a one is 
perverse and in fault, and is condemned of himself." 
Tit. iii. 10, 11. 

Tertullian here refers to the epistle to the Galatians 
as if the passage were to be found there ; but it is only 
one of the numerous instances of quotations merely 
from memory, and without any solicitude for literal 
accuracy, which are so common with the fathers, and 
should always be taken into the account when we are 
reading them. 

EPISTLE TO PHILEMON. 

This letter was addressed not only to Philemon, but 
also to the church which met at his house (1, 2). 
It belongs to A. D. 61 or 62. Philemon was a. wealthy 
citizen of Colosse, a relative of Apphia and Archippus, 
(perhaps husband and father,) who had been converted 
to Christianity by the apostle Paul (13. 19). He 
was a generous believer, full of faith and good works 
(4, 7), and the apostle had entire confidence in 
him (14, 22). Onesimus, an ill-conditioned servant 
of his, had robbed him and then fled to Home (10, 
11, 18, 19) ; where he had met with the apostle Paul, 
had by him been converted to Christ and was much 
beloved by the apostle (12, 13). Wishing to re- 
turn to his home the apostle sends him with this won- 



378 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

derfully affectionate and beautiful letter, to be received 
by Philemon no longer as a slave, but as a friend, as 
a brother beloved (16); for so much the apostle 
required; and he had confidence in Philemon that he 
would do not only this, but even more than he had 
asked (21). The whole transaction was voluntary 
(19), spontaneous, joyous in regard to all three; 
there was no need of applying to the police or calling 
out the militia, or putting a chain around the court- 
house, or doing any of those violent and disgraceful 
things, which made some of our American cities infa- 
mous, when fugitive slaves were to be returned to their 
southern masters. Of all the shameful travesties of 
Scripture, there never was one more shameful and 
ridiculous than that which put the story of Paul and 
Onesimus on a parallel with the transactions under the 
Satanic fugitive slave law of America. 

Testimonies to the Epistle to Philemon. Ignatius, ad 
Ephes. c. 2, Magnes. c. 12, Polyc. c. 6. u I would en- 
joy you perpetually if only I may be worthy." "I 
would enjoy you in all things, if indeed I may be wor- 
thy." " I would enjoy you perpetually." Phil. 20. 

Tertullian, ad Marc. v. 42. u Its brevity gave to 
this epistle alone the privilege of escaping the falsi- 
fying hands of Marcion." 

Epiphanius, Haer. xlii. 9. " Marcion receives ten 
epistles of this holy apostle, ... the ninth being that 
to Philemon." 

Origen, Homil. in Jerem. 19. "Which Paul also 
knowing said to Philemon in regard to Onesimus, in 
his epistle to Philemon, that thy benefit should not be 
of necessity, but willingly." Phil. 14. Matth. Com. 




IP1 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL 379 

tract. 34: "As Paul says to Philemon, For we have 
great joy and consolation in thy love, because the 
bowels of the saints are refreshed by thee, brother." 
Phil. 7. Ibid, tract. 3 : " But concerning Paul it is 
said to Philemon, being such an one as Paul the aged." 
Phil. 9. 

Jerome, Comment. Epist. ad Phil. Jerome is speak- 
ing of those who would exclude the epistle to Phile- 
mon from the canon on the ground that it is simply a 
private letter, treating of personal affairs, and not a 
public doctrinal treatise, and says, if epistles contain- 
ing allusions to private affairs are to be judged not to 
be apostolic, not to belong to Paul, then we must re- 
ject Romans, Timothy, Galatians, Corinthians, and 
others ; but if we receive these, there is no ground for 
rejecting Philemon. 

EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 

It is the purpose of the epistle to the Hebrews to 
prove to the Hebrew Christians, that the new dispen- 
sation is the reality and perfection of that divine reve- 
lation of which the old dispensation was but the type 
and the imperfect beginning. It is written with great 
care and in a style of remarkable correctness. The 
name of the author is not attached to it. If Paul 
were the writer there is good reason for both these 
striking facts. His name and his doctrinal peculiari- 
ties were not in good odor among the Hebrews ; and 
therefore, as a wise man, he would not needlessly 
parade his name before their eyes, and would exercise 
all possible care in the statement of his doctrines. 

The learned and candid Roman Catholic, Professor 



380 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Hug concludes his laborious investigation of this sub- 
ject with the following emphatic declaration: u The 
more intimately I become acquainted with the writings 
of the apostle (Paul), the more I am disposed to re- 
gard the epistle to the Hebrews as his masterpiece. It 
bears the seal of the completion, as the epistles to the 
Thessalonians do that of the commencement, of his 
literary career." 

The question of authorship is and must be, as we 
have before stated, mainly a question of testimony, of 
external evidence ; and, as we shall see in the exhibi- 
tion of the testimony, if Paul is supposed not to be 
the author, the mention of any other name in connec- 
tion with the authorship, is mere guess work without 
any solid foot-hold whatever. 

The author first sets forth the connection between 
the Oxd revelations and the new, and the infinite supe- 
riority of the Son of God, the author of the new rev- 
elation, over the prophets and even the angels who 
were the heralds of the old, (i. ii). He then proceeds 
to demonstrate the superiority of Christ to Moses, the 
one merely the servant, the other the Son, the rightful 
and only inheritor, (iii). Christ also as high priest is 
superior to the high priest of the old covenant, being 
a regal priest after the order of Melchisedek, having a 
perpetual priesthood, and a priesthood of the realities 
and not of the mere type and images of the heavenly 
things, (iv-x). Then follow practical exhortations, 
earnest warnings, illustrations of faith from Old Testa- 
ment examples, and allusions to personal circumstances 
and feelings. The date of the epistle and the place 
of writing it is impossible now to ascertain. The old 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL. 381 

inscription at the close says it was written in Italy and 
forwarded by Timothy ; and nobody now knows any- 
thing more on this subject than the writer of this in- 
scription. From the very earliest times, by the very 
first of the apostolic fathers, the personal friends of the 
apostles themselves, this epistle has been quoted and 
appealed to as an undoubted portion of Holy Scrip- 
ture, though we do not find the name of the author 
mentioned till we come to Pantaenus, the . celebrated 
principal of the theological school at Alexandria, about 
A. D. 180, who unhesitatingly ascribes it to Paul ; and 
from that time the writers in the Eastern church almost 
without exception accept Paul as the author ; while in 
the Western church there was more hesitation and 
doubt as to the author, though none in respect to its 
canonicity and authority ; till we come to Jerome and 
Augustin, from which time it was universally received 
in the church as a genuine and scriptural epistle of the 
apostle Paul. Individual doubters as to the author 
have often shown themselves, and in modern times 
they have become numerous, but the great body of 
the believers have always recognized in it the hand of 
Paul the great apostle. All the ancient catalogues of 
any authority assign fourteen epistles to Paul, which 
necessarily includes Hebrews, for without this there are 
but thirteen. There is certainly no decided internal 
evidence against the authorship of Paul, while there is 
very much in its favor ; while of the external evidence, 
the testimony, it is ten to one, ninety -nine to a hun- 
dred, in favor of Paul. In consequence of the contro- 
versies on the subject, it will be expedient to give 
thes'e testimonies a little more at large than we have 



382 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

done in some other cases, though after all our limits will 
allow us to give but a very small portion of the whole. 
The ancients knew no other author than Paul ; if Paul 
were not the writer we find nothing in them on the 
subject. 

Clement of Rome. In regard to the testimony of 
this writer respecting the epistle to the Hebrews, let us 
first attend to the following statement by Jerome, (Cat. 
Script. Eccl., c. 15). "Clement, in behalf of the Ro- 
man church, wrote a very valuable epistle to the church 
of the Corinthians, which in some places is publicly 
read, and which seems to me to correspond in charac- 
ter very much to the epistle to the Hebrews, which is 
circulated under the name of Paul. He takes many 
things from that epistle ; not only in meaning but in 
the words themselves there is a great similitude be- 
tween them." 

The following extracts from this epistle of Clement, 
fully justify these statements of Jerome, and strongly 
corroborate the canonical authority of the epistle to 
the Hebrews. We select but a very few out of the 
whole number. 

u By him would God have us to taste the knowledge 
of immortality; who, being the brightness of his 
glory, is by so much greater than the angels, as he hath 
by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than 
they. For so it is written, Who maketh his angels 
spirits, and his ministers a flame of fire. But to his 
Son, thus saith the Lord, Thou art my Son, to-day 
have I begotten thee. Ask of me, and I will give thee 
the heathen for thine inheritance, and the utmost parts 
of the earth for thy possession. And again he saith 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL. 383 

unto him, Sit thou on my right hand, until I make 
thine enemies thy footstool. (Heb. i). 

Thus has the humility and godly fear of these great 
and excellent men, recorded in the Scriptures, through 
obedience, made not only us, but also the generations 
before us, better ; even as many as have received his 
holy oracles with fear and truth. Having therefore so 
many, and such great and glorious examples, let us re- 
turn to that peace, which was the mark that from the 
beginning was set before us : Let us look up to the 
Father and Creator of the whole world ; and let us 
hold fast to his glorious and exceeding gifts and bene- 
fits of peace. (Heb. xii). 

Let us receive correction, at which no man ought 
to repine. Beloved, the reproof and the correction 
which we exercise towards one another, is good, and 
exceedingly profitable ; for it unites us the more closely 
to the will of God. For so says the Holy Scripture, 
The Lord corrected me, but he did not deliver me 
over unto death. For whom the Lord loveth he chas- 
teneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth. 
Let us be followers of those who went about in goat- 
skins and sheep-skins, preaching the coming of Christ. 
(Heb. xi). 

All things are open before him ; nor can any thing 
be hid from his counsel. For he is the searcher of the 
thoughts and counsels of the heart ; whose breath is 
in us, and when he pleases he can take it from us. 
(Heb. iv). 

Moses was called faithful in all God's House ; and by 
his conduct the Lord punished Israel by stripes and 
plagues. (Heb. iii). 



384 BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Having therefore this hope, let us hold fast to him 
who is faithful in all his promises, and righteous in all 
his judgments ; who has commanded us not to lie, how 
much more will he not himself lie ? For nothing is 
impossible with God, but to lie. (Heb. vi). 

Justin Martyr. Dial. p. 341. . "This is he who is 
according to the order of Melchisedec king of Salem, 
being an eternal priest of the most high." (Heb. v: 9, 
16, vi: 20, vii: 12). (p. 323). "Eternal priest of 
God, and king, and Christ." Apol. i. "But he is also 
called an angel and apostle." Heb. iii: 1. This is the 
only passage in the whole Bible where Christ is called 
an apostle. 

Irenaeus. Haer. ii. 30. "He alone is God who 
made all things, the only omnipotent, the only Father, 
building and making all things, both visible and in- 
visible, both sensible and senseless, both celestial and 
terrestrial, by the word of his power." (Heb. i: 3). 
v. 5. "Enoch having pleased God was translated in the 
body, foreshowing the translation of the saints." (Heb. 
ii: 5). 

Clement of Alexandria. Strom, vi. p. 645. "For 
Paul also — writing to the Hebrews — and ye again 
have need that I should teach you what be the first 
principles of the oracles of God, and have become as 
those who have need of milk and not of strong meat." 
(Heb. v: 12). ibid. ii. p. 420. "But we desire that 
each one of you should show the same diligence to the 
full assurance of hope, until made a high priest after 
the order of Melchisedec ; the like things says the all 
virtuous wisdom to the apostle Paul." (Heb. vii). 

Tertullian. De Pudic. c. 20. "Therefore admonish- 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL. 385 

ing the disciples that leaving the first principles they 
should go on to perfection, not laying again the foun- 
dation of repentance from works of the dead, for it 
is impossible he says, that those who were once en- 
lightened and have tasted the heavenly gift, and par- 
ticipated in the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the sweet 
word of God, when they fall away, that they should be 
recalled to penitence, they having crucified to them- 
selves the Son of God afresh and put Him to an open 
shame." (Heb. vi. 1-6). 

Origen. Epist. ad Afr. u The author of the epistle 
to the Hebrews says, They were stoned, they were 
sawn asunder, they were slain with the sword.'" Heb. 
xi. 37. Com. in Joan. ii. "And Paul himself says in 
the epistle to the Hebrews, In these last days He hath 
spoken to us by His Son, whom He hath made heir of 
all things, by whom also He made the world." Heb. 
i. 2. Com. in Epist. Rom. vii. " Angels themselves 
also, if you look to the sentiment of Paul, what he 
says, that they are ministering spirits sent forth to min- 
ister to those who shall be the heirs of salvation." Heb. 
i. 7, 14. Com. in Joan. xx. " When also it is written 
in the epistle to the Hebrews, But solid food is for 
them who are perfect." Heb. v. 14. De Orat. "But 
these are his very words in the epistle to the Hebrews, 
But now once in the end of the world hath he appear- 
ed to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself." Heb. 
ix. 26. In Num. Horn. 2. "But Paul also himself, 
writing to the Hebrews says, Ye have not come to the 
tangible mountain and the burning fire, but ye have 
come to mount Zion. Heb. xii. 13. 

25 



386 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Athanasius. Opp. i. p. 266. u For also the blessed 
Paul in the epistle to the Hebrews said, By faith we 
understand that the worlds were made by the word of 
God." Heb. xi. 3. ibid. p. 265. And also the 
apostle said, "God who at sundry times and in divers 
manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the 
prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by His 
Son, whom He hath appointed heir of all things, by 
whom also He made the world." Heb. i. 1, 2. 

Fpiphanius. Haer. 70. Which the apostle indi- 
cates in these words, "For the word of God is quick, 
and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, 
piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and 
spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discern er 
of the thoughts and intents of the heart. Neither is 
there any creature that is not manifest in his sight : but 
all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him 
with whom we have to do." Heb. iv. 12, 13. And 
then also concerning those who have an honorable 
marriage he says, "Marriage is honorable in all, and 
the bed undefiled : but whoremongers and adulterers 
God will judge." Heb. xiii. 4. Haer. 69. "But they 
(the Arians), repudiate this epistle to the Hebrews and 
reject it from the apostolic writings." 

Theodoret Interpret. Epist. ad Heb. "They who 
are afflicted with the Arian disease do nothing that is 
surprising if they rage against the apostolic epistles, 
and separate the epistle to the Hebrews from the rest 
and call it spurious." 

Jerome. Epist. ad Dard. "The epistle which is in- 
scribed to the Hebrews, is received as the work of the 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL. 387 

apostle Paul, not only by the churches of the East, 
but by all the ecclesiastical writers in the Greek lan- 
guage." In Matth. i. 26. "For also Paul, in his epistle 
which is written to the Hebrews, though many of the 
Latins have doubts concerning it." Comment, in 
Isaiam. hi. 6. " Whence also Paul, in the epistle to 
the Hebrews, which the Latin custom does not receive, 
says, Are they not all ministering spirits ?" 

As Eusebius is so important a witness, and he col- 
lected and examined most of the testimonies which 
existed in his own time, it will be of decided utility, 
in regard to the books of which he expresses any 
doubt, to place in one view his own testimony and that 
which he collects from others. I therefore here place 
by itself, a portion of the testimonies collected by Euse- 
bius in regard to the epistle to the Hebrews. 

E. H. v. 26. "Besides the works and epistles of 

Irenaeus, above mentioned, there is a book 

also of various disputations, in which he mentions the 
epistle to the Hebrews," etc. 

E. H. vi. 14. The epistle to the Hebrews he (Clem- 
ent of Alex'a) asserts was written by Paul, to the Hebrews 
in the Hebrew tongue ; but that it was carefully transla- 
ted by Luke, and published among the Greeks. Whence, 
also, one finds the same character of style and of phrase- 
ology in the epistle as in the Acts. "But it is proba- 
ble that the title, Paul the Apostle, was not prefixed 
to it. For as he wrote to the Hebrews, who had im- 
bibed prejudices against him, and suspected him, he 
wisely guards against diverting them from the perusal, 
by giving his name." A little after this he observes: 



388 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

"But now as the blessed presbyter used to say, 'Since 
the Lord who was the apostle of the Almighty, was 
sent to the Hebrews, Paul by reason of his inferiority, 
as if sent to the Gentiles, did not subscribe himself an 
apostle of the Hebrews ; both out of reverence for the 
Lord, and because he wrote of his abundance to the 
Hebrews, as a herald and apostle of the Gentiles.' ' 

E. H. vi. 41. Dionysius of Alexandria says, " There 
were some who took the spoiling of their goods joy- 
fully, like those of whom the apostle Paul testifies." 
Heb. x. 39. 

E. H. iii. 38. u We may mention as an instance 
what Ignatius has said in the epistles we have cited, 
and Clement of Rome in that universally received by 
all, which he wrote in the name of the church at Rome 
to that of Corinth. In which, after giving many senti- 
ments taken from the epistle to the Hebrews, and also 
literally quoting the words, he most clearly shows that 
this work is by no means a late production. Whence 
it is probable that this was also numbered with the 
other writings of the apostles. For as Paul had ad- 
dressed the Hebrews in the language of his country ; 
some say that the evangelist Luke, others that Clement, 
translated the epistle. Which also appears more like 
the truth, as the epistle of Clement and that to the 
Hebrews, preserve the same features of style and 
phraseology, and because the sentiments in both these 
works are not very different." 

E. H. ii. 17. Eusebius is quoting from an account 
of the ascetics in Egypt by Philo, and says : "After 
other matters, he adds : ' The whole time between the 
morning and evening, is a constant exercise ; for as 



THE FOURTEEN EPISTLES OF PAUL. 389 

they are engaged with the sacred Scriptures, they rea- 
son and comment upon them, explaining the philoso- 
phy of their country in an allegorical manner. For 
they consider the verbal interpretation as signs indica- 
tive of a secret sense communicated in obscure intima- 
tions. They have also commentaries of ancient men, 
who, as the founders of the sect, have left many mon- 
uments of their doctrine in allegorical representations, 
which they use as certain models, imitating the manner 
of the original institution.' These facts appear to 
have been stated by a man who, at least, has paid atten- 
tion to those that have expounded the sacred writings. 
But it is highly probable, that the ancient commenta- 
ries which he says they have, are the very gospels and 
writings of the apostles, and probably some exposi- 
tions of the ancient prophets, such as are contained in 
the epistle to the Hebrews and many others of St 
Paul's epistles." 



CHAPTER ELEVENTH. 

THE SEVEN CATHOLIC EPISTLES AND THE COMPARISON OF 
THE APOCRYPHAL EPISTLES WITH THE CANONICAL. 

THE SEVEN CATHOLIC EPISTLES. 

The seven Catholic epistles, which in the common 
edition of the Testament immediately follow the four- 
teen epistles of Paul, though in the earlier manuscripts 
they precede instead of follow Paul, are so called be- 
cause, with a single exception, and that the shortest 
one, the third of John, they are not addressed to any 
particular church or person, but have a general direc- 
tion, and by some of the ancients they are called evan- 
gelical or circular letters (Oecumenius, Proleg. in Ep„ 
Jac). 

In general they have always formed a part of the 
canon of the New Testament. Any partial exception 
to this rule will be adverted to in the notices of the 
separate books. 

EPISTLE OF JAMES. 

In the historical books of the New Testament we read 
of James the son of Zebedee, one of the twelve apos- 
tles of our Lord, who very early suffered martyrdom 
(Acts xii) ; of James the son of Alpheus, and of James 
the brother of our Lord. The last two are supposed 



392 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

by many to be identical, and it is not easy, either from 
the statements of Scripture or the testimony of the 
early ecclesiastical historians, to decide positively 
whether they are so or not. From the best examina- 
tion which I have been able to make, it is my opinion 
that James the brother of the Lord is a different per- 
son from James the son of Alpheus, and that it was the 
idea of the perpetual virginity of Mary which induced 
many of the early church fathers to identify the two. 

James, the brother of our Lord, was, as I think, a 
younger son of Mary the mother of Jesus ; he is the 
one mentioned in Acts xii. 17, xv. 13, xxi. 18, Gal. ii. 
9, Matt. xiii. 55, Mark vi. 3 ; and it was he who pre- 
sided so long and so honorably over the church at Je- 
rusalem, till he met with a violent death at the hands 
of a mob as related by Josephus (Antiq. xx. 8:1) 
and by Eusebius (E. H. ii. 23) ; and that this is the 
James who wrote the epistle. There are no data 
for fixing the time of its composition. It may have 
been as early as A. D. 45 or as late as 62, but the ear- 
lier date is the more probable. 

It is the object of the epistle to exhort to steadfast- 
ness in the Christian profession, to rebuke certain faults 
which began to be prevalent in the Christian churches 
composed principally of Jews, and particularly to 
guard against the abuses of the doctrine of salvation 
by faith alone. This last characteristic favors the idea 
of the later date of > the epistle. It was addressed par- 
ticularly to Jewish Christians living out of Palestine 
(James i. 1, ii. 21) ; and it is not at all systematic in 
its arrangement, but impulsive and miscellaneous. It 
contemplates the afflicted and oppressed condition of 



THE SEVEN CATHOLIC EPISTLES. 393 

the Hebrew Christians, and warns against the mistake 
of those who are hearers of the word only without 
practical obedience (i.), rebukes a manifest partiality 
for rich men in the congregations (ii.), shows the ne- 
cessity of good works as the fruit and the evidence of 
faith (iii. -i v.); gives a reproof of oppressive rich men, 
exhortation to steadfastness under persecution, warning 
against extra judicial oaths, and directions for the care 
of the sick (v.). 

The epistle was received as genuine Scripture in the 
Syrian Peschito, and is quoted by the Syrian saint, 
Ephraem, as the work of our Lord's brother. It was 
read by the apostolic fathers, Clement of Rome and 
Irenaeus; it is expressly mentioned by Origen, doubtful- 
ly received by Eusebius, and rejected by Theodore of 
Mopsuestia. During the fourth century it obtained full 
canonical authority both in the Greek and Latin 
churches. All this will clearly appear in the quota- 
tions which follow. 

TESTIMONIES TO THE EPISTLE OF JAMES. 

Ephraem Syr., Opp. Graec. iii. 51. u James, the 
brother of our Lord, says, Howl and weep." James v. 1. 

Clement of Borne, 1 Epist. ad Cor. c. 30. u For God, 
he says, resisteth the proud, but giveth grace to the 
humble." James iv. 6. c. 38 : " Let the wise man 
shew his wisdom not in words but in good works." 
James iii. 13. c. 17: u Abraham had a great testimo- 
ny and was called the friend of God." James ii. 23. 
c. 10: "Abraham, who was called God's friend, was in 
like manner found faithful, inasmuch as he obeyed the 
commands of God." James ii. 23. c. 31 : u On what 



394 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

account was our father Abraham blessed ? Was it not 
that through faith he wrought righteousnes and 
truth?" James ii. 2. C. 23: "Far be from us that 
Scripture which says, Miserable are the double minded 
and those who are doubtful of soul." James i. 8. 

Shepherd of Her mas, Simil. v. 4. " Whoever is the 
servant of God and has the Lord in his heart, he seeks 
wisdom from Him and obtains it. . . . Let them 
not hesitate to seek of the Lord, for the Lord is of 
goodness so profound that to those seeking from Him 
He gives all things without interruption." James i. 5. 
Command, xii. 5 : " The Devil can wrestle but he can 
not conquer ; for if you resist him he will flee from 
you in confusion." James iv. 7. Ibid, 5 : "Rather 
fear the Lord, who is able both to save and to de- 
stroy." James iv. 12. Vision, iii. 9 : " See to it, there- 
fore, ye who glory in your riches, lest they groan who 
are in want, and their groaning ascend to the Lord, 
and ye be shut out with your goods beyond the gate 
of the tower." James v. 1-4. 

Irenaeus, ad Haer. iv. 16. He shows that Abraham 
himself was justified without circumcision and without 
the observance of the Sabbath. Abraham believed 
God and it was counted to him for righteousness, and 
he was called the friend of God," James ii. 23. 13 : 
u Abraham was made the friend of God." 

Athanasius, ad Serap. 1. u But with God, says 
James, there is no variableness neither shadow of turn- 
ing." James i. 17. Cont. Arium. Or. 3 : 'As James the 
apostle taught saying, Of His own will begat he us 
with the word of truth." James i. 18. 

Clement of Alexandria, Strom, iii. u And so he 



THE SEVEN CATHOLIC EPISTLES. 395 

called him (Abraham) His friend." James ii. 23. Ibid : 
" But the Scripture says to them, God resisteth the 
proud and giveth grace to the humble." James ii. 6. 

Tertullian, De Orat. c. 8. "But far be it from the 
Lord that He should seem to tempt, as if He were 
ignorant of his faith." James l 13. u Whence was 
Abraham reputed the friend of God, if not from 
equity and righteousness of natural law ? " James ii. 23. 

Origen, Comment, in John xix. "For if it may 
even be called faith, yet it may be without works, but 
faith of this kind is dead, as we read in the epistle 
which is circulated under the name of James." 
Comment, in Ep. ad Bom. iv. : u Hear also James, the 
brother of the Lord, . . . when he says, he who will 
be the friend of this world, is the enemy of God." 
James iv. 4. Ibid: "And finally James the apostle 
says this, Resist the Devil and he will flee from you ; 
draw nigh to God and he will draw nigh to you." 
James iv. 7, 8. Ibid, " So also James the apostle 
says, every good gift and every perfect gift is from 
above, and cometh down from the Father of lights." 
James i. 17. In Psalm 30: "And in James, as the 
body without the spirit is dead." In Ps. 36 : " For it 
is an apostle who says, in many things we all offend, 
and if any man offend not in word, he is a perfect 
man." James iii. 2. Select. Exod: " Wherefore it is 
said, God is not tempted of evil." 

Epiphanius, Haer. xxxi. "And, again, St. James 
speaks concerning such teaching, that it is not the wis- 
dom that cometh from above, but is earthly, sensual, 
devilish. But the wisdom which is from above is first 
pure, then peaceable, gentle and easy to be entreated, 



396 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

full of mercy and good fruits." etc. James iii. 17. Hid, 
lxxvii. : " According as it is written, pure religion be- 
fore God and the father is this, to visit the fatherless 
and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself un- 
spotted from the world." i. 27. 

Jerome, Catal. Script. Eccl. c. 2. " James, who is 
called the brother of the Lord, and by surname the 
Just . . . after the passion of the Lord was or- 
dained by the apostles bishop of Jerusalem, wrote only 
one epistle, which is of the seven Catholic epistles." 

As Eusebius expresses some doubts as to the epistle 
of James, we here present in one view both his own 
testimony and that which he has selected from others, 
as we have done in regard to the epistle to the He- 
brews, and for the same reason. 

(Kirchhofer, p. 264-66, 62.) 

In Psalm : " For the holy apostle says, Is any afflicted 
among you, let him pray ; is any merry, let him sing 
praises." Dem. Evang. iii. 5 : "Afterwards James, the 
brother of our Lord, who was of those that formerly 
dwelt at Jerusalem, and was called the Just on account 
of the excellence of his virtue, being interrogated by 
the high priest and the magistrates of the Jewish na- 
tion as to what opinion he had concerning Christ, when 
he answered plainly, that he was the Son of God, they 
put him to death by stoning. 

E. H. i. 12: from Clement of Alexandria. u The 
names of our Saviour's apostles are sufficiently obvi- 
ous to every one, from his Gospels ; but of the seventy 
disciples, no catalogue is given anywhere. Barnabas, 
indeed is said to have been one of them, of whom 
there is distinguished notice in the Acts of the Apos- 



THE SEVEN CATHOLIC EPISTLES. 397 

ties ; and also in St. Paul's epistle to the Galatians. 
Sosthenes, who sent letters with Paul to the Corinthi- 
ans, is said to have been one of these. Clement, in 
the fifth of his Hypotyposes or Institutions, in which 
he also mentions Cephas, of whom Paul also says, that 
he came to Antioch, and "that he withstood him to his 
face ;" — says, that one who had the same name with 
Peter the apostle, was one of the seventy ; and that 
Matthias, who was numbered with the apostles in place 
of Judas, and he who had been honoured to be a can- 
didate with him, is also said to have been deemed 
worthy of the same calling with the seventy. They 
also say that Thaddeus was one of them ; concerning 
whom, I shall presently relate a narrative that has 
come down to us. Moreover, if any one observe with 
attention, he will find more disciples of our Saviour 
than the seventy, on the testimony of Paul, who says, 
that u he appeared after his resurrection, first to Cephas, 
then to the twelve, and after these to five hundred 
brethren at once." Of whom, he says, "some are 
fallen asleep," but the greater part were living at the 
time he wrote. Afterwards, he says, he appeared to 
James ; he, however, was not merely one of these dis- 
ciples of our Saviour, but he was one of his brethren. 
Lastly, when beside these, there still was a considerable 
number who were apostles in imitation of the twelve, 
such as Paul himself was, he adds, saying "afterwards 
he appeared to all the apostles." 

E. H. ii. 1. Then also James, called the brother of 
our Lord, because he is also called the son of Joseph.. 
For Joseph was esteemed the father of Christ, because 
the Virgin being betrothed to him, "she was found 



398 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

with child by the Holy Ghost before they came to- 
gether," as the narrative of the Holy Gospels shows. 
This James, therefore, whom the ancients, on account 
of the excellence of his virtue, surnamed the Just, was 
the first that received the episcopate of the church at 
Jerusalem. But Clement, in the sixth book of his In- 
stitutions, represents it thus : "Peter, and James, and 
John, after the ascension of our Saviour, though they 
had been preferred by our Lord, did not contend for 
the honour, but chose James the Just as bishop of Je- 
rusalem." And the same author, in the seventh book 
of the same work, writes thus: "The Lord imparted 
the gift of knowledge to James the Just, to John and 
Peter after his resurrection, these delivered it to the 
rest of the apostles, and they to the seventy, of whom 
Barnabas was one. There were, however, two Jameses ; 
one called the Just, who was thrown from a wing of 
the temple, and beaten to death with a fuller's club, 
and another, who was beheaded. Paul also makes 
mention of the Just in his epistles. "But other of the 
apostles," says he, "saw I none, save James the broth- 
er of our Lord." 

E. H. ii. 23. After giving from the ancients a minute 
account of the acts and martyrdom of James, he con- 
cludes as follows : " These accounts are given respect- 
ing James, who is said to have written the first of the 
epistles general, (catholic;) but it is to be observed 
that some consider it spurious. Not many indeed of 
the ancients have mentioned it, and not even that call- 
ed the epistle of Jude, which is also one of the seven 
called catholic epistles. Nevertheless we know, that 
these, with the rest, are publicly used in most of the 
churches." 



THE SEVEN CATHOLIC EPISTLES. 399 



THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER. 

Peter was among the first, and most zealous of the 
twelve apostles of Christ, (John i. 43-45, Matt. iv. 18, 
xviii. 2) ; and after the resurrection, took a leading part 
in the formation and guidance of the Christian Church, 
being the first to form a church out of the Jewish com- 
munity, and the first to admit the Gentiles also with- 
out requiring of them circumcision. (Acts i-xi). After 
his miraculous deliverance from prison by the help of 
the angel, he left Jerusalem, (Acts xii.), and does not 
appear again till the council was called at Jerusalem to 
consider the case of the Gentile converts, (Acts xv.), 
where he decidedly took the liberal side. We are in- 
formed by the apostle Paul, .that he afterwards at An- 
tioch yielded again for a while to his Jewish preju- 
dices, and brought upon himself in consequence a 
sharp rebuke. (Col. ii). He was the apostle to the 
Jews mainly, as Paul was to the Gentiles. His field of 
labor was principally in the East, he directs his epistle 
to the Christians of the East, (1 Pet. i. 1), and dates 
it from Babylon the old Chaldean metropolis. (1 Pet. 
v. 13). There is no reason for understanding the word 
Babylon here in any other than its literal sense. It is 
only the anxiety of some to give Peter a long resi- 
dence at Rome, that ever imagined here a spiritual 
Babylon, that is Rome. 

It is sufficiently attested by Christian antiquity that 
Peter visited Rome, preached there, and there suffer- 
ed martyrdom ; but that he ever made any long stay 
in that city, or ever saw it till quite the latter part of 
his life, does not appear. Indeed a careful inspection 



400 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

of the narrative in Acts and of the epistles of Paul to 
the Romans, leads us inevitably to the conclusion that 
he did not visit Rome till after that epistle was written. 
This whole subject is very ably and satisfactorily dis- 
cussed by Prof. Tholuck in the introduction to his 
commentary on Romans. 

There are no sufficient data for assigning the date 
of this epistle. It was probably written after Peter's 
first missionary tour though the East, and before Paul 
to the Romans, perhaps as early as A. D. 55 or 58. 

The epistle is full of Christian love and sympathy, 
wholly of a practical nature, and so miscellaneous in 
its character as scarcely to be susceptible of a logical 
analysis, nor is such an analysis necessary to guide 
the reader in the study of it. 

After a reference to the blessed future which awaits 
the true Christian, (i. 3-12), he exhorts believers to a 
pure and holy life worthy of their calling, (i, 14, ii. 12), 
especially to an observance of all their civil, social, 
and domestic duties, (ii. 13, iii. 12), and in view of 
the sufferings and death of Christ to bear patiently the 
slanders and persecutions to which they were subject- 
ed, (iii. 13, iv. 19). Finally, particular exhortations 
to elders and private Christians, (v. 1-9), together 
with concluding greetings, (v. 10-14). 

The genuineness of the epistle has always been ad- 
mitted, and the testimonies to it are uniform from the 
very beginning. 

TESTIMONIES TO I. PETER. 

Clement of Rome. "Love hideth a multitude of 
sins. 1 Pet. iv. 8. 



THE SEVEN CATHOLIC EPISTLES. 401 

Pastor Hermas. Yis. x. 2. "Cast your cares on 
the Lord and he will direct them." 1 Pet. v. 9. 

Poly carp. Ad Philip, c. 1, "In whom, not seeing, 
ye believe, and believing ye rejoice with joy unspeak- 
able and full of glory." 1 Pet. i. 8. Ibid. c. 2. 
"Wherefore girding up your loins, serve God in fear 
and truth, believing in Him who raised up our Lord 
Jesus Christ from the dead, and gave him glory and 
a seat at His right hand." Pet. i. 13, 21. Ibid. c. 10. 
"Having your conversation honest among the Gentiles, 
that you may have praise for your good works and the 
Lord be not blasphemed." 1 Pet. ii. 12. Ibid. c. 8. 
"Let us therefore unwaveringly persevere in our hope 
and in the earnest of our righteousness, which is Christ 
Jesus, who bore our sins in his own body on the tree, 
who did not sin neither was guile found in his mouth, 
but on our account and that we might live in him, en- 
dured all things ; wherefore let us be imitators of his 
patience, and if we suffer on account of his name, we 
glorify him." 1 Pet. ii. 21-24. Ibid. c. 2. "Not ren- 
dering evil for evil nor cursing for cursing." 1 Pet. 
iii. 9. 

"Who comes the judge of quick and dead." 1 Pet. 
iv. 5. c. 7. "Watching unto prayer." 1 Pet. iv. 7. 
c. 10. "Be ye all subject one to another." 1 Pet. v. 5. 

Eusebius. E. H. iv. 14. "Polycarp, indeed, in his 
epistle to the Philipians which is extant, uses testimo- 
nies from the first epistle to Peter." 

Papias. Eusebius E. H. iii. 39. "Papias uses testi- 
monies taken from the first epistle of Peter." 

Letter to Diognetus. "He gave his own son a rai> 
som for us, the just for the unjust." 1 Pet. iii. 13. 
2G 



402 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Letters of the Churches of Vienne and Lyons. Euseb. 
E. H. v. 2. "They humbled themselves under the 
mighty hand by which they are now powerfully exalt- 
ed." 1 Pet. v. 6. 

Irenaeus. iv. 9. "Peter says in his epistle, whom 
not seeing ye love, in whom, not seeing him now, ye 
believe, and rejoice with joy unspeakable." 1 Pet. i. 8. 
16. "On this account Peter says, have not your liber- 
ty as a cloak of maliciousness." 1 Pet. ii. 16. 

Clement of Alexandria, Strom, iv. "But if ye suf- 
fer for righteousness sake, says Peter, happy are ye, 
and be not afraid of their terror, neither be troubled ; 
but sanctify the Lord God in your hearts ; and be 
ready always to give an answer to every man that 
asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you, with 
meekness and fear. Having a good conscience ; that, 
whereas they speak evil of you, as of evil-doers, they 
may be ashamed that falsely accuse your good conver- 
sation in Christ. For it is better, if the will of God 
be so, that ye suffer for well-doing, than for evil-doing." 
1 Pet. iii. 14-17. Paed. i. "And so Peter also says, 
wherefore laying aside all malice, and all guile, and 
hypocrisies, and envies, and all evil speakings, as new- 
born babes, desire the sincere milk of the word, that 
ye may grow thereby : if so be ye have tasted that 
Christ is the Lord." 1 Pet. ii. 1-3. 

Tertullian. Scorpiac. c. 12. " Indeed Peter says to 
them of Pontus, How great is the glory, if ye bear it, 
when ye are punished not as delinquents. For this is 
grace and in this ye were called." 1 Pet. i. 21. c. 14. 
''Peter says the king is to be honored." 

Origen. Comment, in Matth. xv. "From the first 



THE SEVEN CATHOLIC EPISTLES. 403 

epistle of Peter Peter says, in whom, that is 

Christ, though now ye see him not, yet believing ye 
rejoice." 1 Pet. i. 8. 

De Princip. 2. "They do not read what is written 
concerning the hope of those who were taken off by 
the flood, concerning which hope Peter says in his 
first epistle, Christ indeed was put to death in the 
flesh, but quickened in the spirit: By which also 
he went and preached unto the spirits in prison ; which 
sometime were disobedient, when once the long-suffer- 
ing of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark 
was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls, were 
saved by water." 1 Pet. iii. 18-20. On Psalm third 
Origen again quotes the same passage at length. 

Comment, in Joan. vi. "And concerning that jour- 
ney in the spirit to the prison, in the catholic epistle, 
with Peter, put to death he says in the flesh, but made 
alive in the spirit." 

Cyprian. De bon. pat. "Peter also on whom in 
the estimation of the Lord the church is founded, de- 
clares in his epistle, Christ also suffered for us, leaving 
us an example, that we should follow his steps: Who 
did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth : 
Who, when he was reviled, reviled not again ; when 
he suffered, he threatened not ; but committed himself 
to him that judge th righteously." 1 Pet. ii. 21-23. 
Epist. 58. "Peter also the apostle taught that persecu- 
tions would be experienced, in order that we might 

be proved for he states in his epistle saying, 

Beloved, think it not strange, concerning the fiery trial 
which is to try you, as though some strange thing hap- 
pened unto you : but rejoice, inasmuch as ye are par- 



404 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

takers of Christ's sufferings ; that when his glory shall 
be revealed, ye may be glad also with exceeding joy. 
If ye be reproached for the name of Christ, happy 
are ye ; for the Spirit of glory and of God resteth up- 
on you. On their part he is evil syoken of, but on 
your part he is glorified." 1 Pet. iv. 12-14. 

Eusebius. H. E. iii. 4. "And also in what provin- 
ces Peter, preaching Christ to those of the circum- 
cision, delivered to them the doctrine of the new cov- 
enant, may be clearly ascertained from that epistle, 
which, as I have said, is by all and without controversy 
ascribed to him, which he writes to those of the He- 
brews who are dispersed through Pontus, Galatia, Cap- 
padocia, Asia and Bithynia." 

Aihanasius, Epist. ad Serap. "Peter also writes, 
receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation of 
your souls. Of which salvation the prophets have in- 
quired and searched diligently, who prophesied of the 
grace that should come unto you : Searching what, or 
what manner of time the Spirit of Christ which was 
in them did signify, when it testified beforehand the 
sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow/ 7 
1 Pet. i. 9-11. 

Eptjphamus. vii. "For says the Scripture, Christ 
suffered for us in the flesh ; and again, being put to 
death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit." 1 Pet. 
iv. 1, iii. 18. 

Jerome. Catal. Script. 1. "Simon Peter wrote 
two epistles, which are called catholic, of which the 
second is by many doubted, on account of its diver- 
sity in style from the first." 

Epist. 120. "And finally the two epistles which are 



THE SEVEN CATHOLIC EPISTLES. 405 

called Peter's are diverse in style and character and 
the structure of words ; from which we may under- 
stand that he made use of different interpreters, ac- 
cording to the exigencies in different circumstan- 
ces." ' 

Ibid, E. H. v. 1. "A wonderful interposition of 
God was then exhibited, and the boundless mercy of 
Christ clearly displayed, a thing that had rarely happen- 
ed among the brethren, but by no means beyond the 
reach of the skill of Christ. For those that had fallen 
from the faith on the first seizure, were also themselves 
imprisoned, and shared in the sufferings of the rest. 
This renunciation did them no good at this time, but 
those that confessed what they really were, were im- 
prisoned as Christians ; no other charge being alleged 
against them. But these, at last, were confined as 
murderers and guilty culprits, and were punished with 
twice the severity of the rest. The former, indeed, 
were refreshed by the joy of martyrdom, the hope of 
the promises, the love of Christ, and the spirit of the 
Father ; but the latter were sadly tormented by their 
own conscience. So that the difference was obvious 
to all in their very countenances, when they were led 
forth. For the one went on joyful, much glory and 
grace being mixed in their faces, so that their bonds 
seemed to form noble ornaments, and, like those of a 
bride, adorned with various golden bracelets, and im- 
pregnated with the sweet odour of Christ, they ap- 
peared to some anointed with earthly perfumes. But 
the others, with downcast look, dejected, sad, and cov- 
ered with every kind of shame, in addition to this, 



406 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

were reproached by the heathen as mean and cowardly, 
bearing the charge of murderers, and losing the hon- 
ourable, glorious^ and life-giving appellation of Chris- 
tians. The rest, however, seeing these effects, were 
so much the more coufirmed, and those that were 
taken immediately, confessed, not even admitting 
the thought suggested by diabolical objections." In- 
troducing some further remarks they again proceed : 
'After these things their martyrdom was finally distri- 
buted into various kinds ; for platting and constituting 
one crown of various colours and all kinds of flowers, 
they offer it to the Father. It was right, indeed, that 
these noble wrestlers, who had sustained a diversified 
contest, and come off with a glorious victory, should 
bear away the great crown of immortality.' ' 1 Peter 
iv. 13-16". 

THE SECOND EPISTLE OF PETER. 

This epistle claims most distinctly to have been 
written by the apostle Peter, the author of the first 
epistle, and that too in near view of death, the death 
of a martyr (i. 1, 14-18, iii. 1, 13). The whole tone 
and bearing of the epistle are in exact accordance 
with this claim. Its sentiment is elevated, pure, sweet, 
Christ-like, most admirably appropriate to the position 
claimed, and scarcely equaled in the Bible itself except 
by the address of Paul to Timothy in like circumstan- 
ces. Read the words i. 14-18 : " Yea, I think it meet, 
as long as I am in this tabernacle, to stir you up by 
putting you in remembrance ; knowing that shortly I 



THE SEVEN CATHOLIC EPISTLES. 407 

must put off this my tabernacle, even as our Lord 
Jesus Christ hath shewed me. Moreover I will en- 
deavor that ye may be able after my decease to have 
these things always in remembrance. For we have 
not followed cunningly devised fables, when we made 
known unto you the power and coming of our Lord 
Jesus Christ, but were eye-witnesses of his majesty. 
For he received from God the Father honor and 
glory, when there came such a voice to him from the 
excellent glory, This is my beloved son, in whom I 
am well pleased. And this voice which came from 
heaven we heard, when we were with him in the holy 
mount." And compare the utterances of Paul. 2 Tim. 
iv. 6-8. 

To me it seems utterly impossible that a man who 
was practicing a deliberate and conscious imposture 
could feel or give utterance to sentiments like these. 
The internal evidence of genuineness, from this source 
alone, is morally irresistible. The internal evidence 
also from the peculiar use of single words in the two 
epistles is thoroughly convincing. Though both epis- 
tles are very short, yet there are striking peculiarities 
of language the same in both, which occur nowhere 
else, or but very seldom in all the New Testament. 
For example the word anoOamg (apothesis) is found in 
1 Pet. hi. 21, and 2 Pet. i. 14, in the same sense, and 
nowhere else in all the New Testament. So the word 
(xQExrj (arete) occurs in 1 Pet. ii. 9, and 2 Pet. i. 3, 5, and 
but once besides in all the New Testament. The word 
aamXog (aspilos), 1 Pet. i. 19, and 2 Pet. iii. 14, and only 
twice besides in all the New Testament. Again the 
word avaaiQoyrj (anastrojplie) occurs six times in the 



408 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

first of Peter, twice in the second of Peter, and only 
once besides in each of the following epistles, to wit, 
James, 1 Tim., Eph. and Gal. In ordinary cases these 
facts alone would be deemed sufficient to establish the 
identity of authorship. 

As to the difference of style of which Jerome speaks, 
it is only such a difference and exactly such a differ- 
ence as we should expect in an apostle in the full vigor 
of his life and apostleship, and the same apostle at the 
close of his career and in the daily expectation of mar- 
tyrdom ; and the same difference which we find be- 
tween the second of Timothy and the epistle to the 
Romans. 

Several causes contributed to render its reception in 
the ancient churches later than that of the first epistle. 

1. It was addressed mainly to obscure churches, 
remote from the great lines of communication, in a 
region strongly suspected of heresy (Euseb. E. H. vi. 
20), and so near the time of the apostle's death that 
it did not have the advantage of his personal presence 
and authority. 

2. It related to a state of things which was not fully 
developed till sometime after the epistle was written. 
That which in the epistle of Jude is history, is in 2 
Pet. ii. prediction ; in Peter the verbs are in the future 
tense, in Jude they are in the past tense ; Peter utters 
the prophecy and Jude records the fulfillment of the 
prophecy. This one fact of itself is decisive of the 
relation as to time between Jude and 2 Peter. Com- 
pare 2 Pet. ii. 1-3 and Jude vs. 4, 8, 10-13, 16, 19, 
22, 23. 

The time of writing was near the apostle's death, 



THE SEVEN CATHOLIC EPISTLES. 409 

the place wholly uncertain as there are no data to 
fix it. 

The course of thought is as follows: 

The apostle, after a brief introduction and an ethical 
exhortation, speaks of the certainty of the Christian 
doctrine and its confirmation especially by the trans- 
figuration of Christ on the mountain and the divine 
voice, which he had seen and heard, and also by the 
prophecies of the Old Testament (L). He then speaks 
of the teachers of error who would afterwards arise 
(ii.). He then gives assurance that notwithstanding 
the vain talk of those " whose great principle it is that 
all things continue as they were, and who scorn the 
notion of the great God ever coming to touch the 
orderly mechanism of the universe " — the time will 
come for a miraculous dissolution and reconstruction 
of the whole present system of things, though, since 
one day is with the Lord as a thousand years and a 
thousand years as one day, we have no ground for 
affirming anything as to the nearness or remoteness of 
that great event, thus joining with the apostle Paul 
(2 Thess. ii.) in rebuking those presumptuous teachers, 
not divinely inspired, who even in that age insisted on 
the immediate advent of Christ as necessary to the 
fulfillment of prophecy. 

TESTIMONIES TO n. PETER. 

Clement of Rome, ad Cor. i. 7, 11. u Noah preached 
repentance ; and as many as harkened to him were 
saved. Noah, being proved to be faithful, did by his 
ministry preach regeneration to the world ; and the 
Lord saved by him all the living creatures, that went 



410 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

with one accord together into the ark. By hospitality 
and godliness was Lot saved out of Sodom, when all 
the country round about was destroyed by fire and 
brimstone : the Lord thereby making it manifest, that 
he will not forsake those that trust in him ; but will 
bring the disobedient to punishment and correction. 
For his wife, who went out with him, being of a 
different mind, and not continuing in the same obedi- 
ence, was for that reason set forth for an example, 
being turned into a pillar of salt unto this day." 2 Pet. 
ii. 5 ff. 

Shepherd of Hermas, Yis. iii. 7. " There are those 
who believed, but by their hesitation forsook the true 
way." 2 Pet. ii. 15. iv. 3 : "Ye are they who escape 
from this world." 2 Pet. ii. 20. 

Justin Martyr, Dial. p. 303. "We know the say- 
ing, one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, 
pertaining to this." 2 Pet. iii. 8. 

Theophilus, ad Autol. ii. "But men of God, full 
of the Holy Spirit, and inspired by God, were ap- 
pointed prophets, and were taught of God, holy and 
righteous." 2 Pet. i. 10. 

Origen, Comment, in Epist. ad Bom. viii. "And 
Peter says in his epistle, Grace and peace be multiplied 
unto you in the knowledge of God — and again, As 
good stewards of the manifold grace of God." 2 Pet. 
i. 2, 1 Pet. iv. 10. Horn. inLevit. iv. : "And again Pe- 
ter says, Ye are made partakers of the divine nature." 
2 Pet. i. 4. Horn, in Num. xiii. : "As the Scripture 
also says in the passage, The dumb animal, speaking 
with a human voice, rebuked the madness of the 
prophet." 2 Pet. ii. 16. Horn, in Exod. xii. : "For I 



THE SEYEN CATHOLIC EPISTLES. 411 

know it is written, of whom any one is overcome, of 
the same is he brought into bondage." 2 Pet. ii. 19. 
Dial, de rect. Fide. ii. : "But the apostle is mentioned 
by Peter, according to the wisdom, he says, given to 
my brother Paul." 2 Pet. iii. 15. 

Firmilianus, Ep. ad Cyp. 75. " Defaming the blessed 
apostles Peter and Paul, .... who in their epistles 
execrated the heretics, and admonished us to avoid 
them." 2 Pet. ii. 

Athanasius, Dial, de Sac. Trin. i. "And it is written 
in the Catholic epistles, whereby are given unto us ex- 
ceeding great and precious promises, that ye may be 
made partakers of the divine nature." 2 Pet. i. 4. 
Cont. Arian. Orat. ii. : "And this is what Peter says, 
that ye may be made partakers of the divine nature." 
2 Pet. i. 4. 

Epiphanius, Haer. lxvi. "Which Peter indicates 
in his epistle by these words, Giving heed to the pro- 
phetic word as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, 
until the day dawn, and the daystar arise in your 
hearts." 2 Pet. i. 19. 

Jerome. See testimonies to 1 Peter. 

Melito. "At another time there was a flood of water, 
and the just were preserved in an ark of wood by the 
ordinance of God. So also it will be at the last time ; 
there will be a flood of fire and the earth shall be 
burned up, . . . and the just shall be delivered from 
the fray, like their fellows in the ark from the waters 
of the deluge." 2 Pet. iii. 5, 6, 10-12. Home's Introd. 
iv. p. 606, tenth edition. 



412 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE 



THE FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN. 

There is no reasonable doubt, there never has been 
any, that the first epistle ascribed to John in the New 
Testament, is a genuine production of that apostle and 
evangelist. The internal evidence is conclusive, and 
the external testimony unanimous and uncontradicted. 
If we have evidence that the Tusculan Questions be- 
long to Cicero, we have evidence still stronger (if pos- 
sible) that this epistle belongs to the bosom friend of 
Jesus. It is true that the passage v. 7, is not found in 
any of the early Greek manuscripts of the New Tes- 
tament, and we may admit it to be an interpolation 
without any prejudice to the integrity of the epistle. 
There is no internal evidence against the passage, it is 
quite in place where it stands, it is quite in the style 
and manner of John ; but there is a lack of external 
testimony in its favor ; and on all such questions the 
internal and external must co-operate to produce a 
decision. 

There are no data to determine positively the time or 
place of writing or the particular persons to whom the 
epistle was at first addressed ; but all the probabilities 
are that it was written at Ephesus after the publication 
of the Gospel, consequently at a late period of life, and 
addressed especially to the churches with which he 
was personally conversant in Asia Minor and the 
vicinity. It is full of the loveliness of the Gospel, and 
while the Boanerges is clearly seen in its pages, the 
predominating qualities are clearly those which made 
John the disciple whom Jesus loved. 

According to one of the most eminent of the mod* 



HE SEVEN CATHOLIC EPISTLES. 413 

era commentators on John, after the introduction (i. 
1-4), there are two principal sections, each pervaded 
by a single master-thought, and both tending to illus- 
trate the leading subject of the whole, to wit, fellow- 
ship with God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. 
1. The theme (i. 5-ii. 28) is, God is light. 2. God is 
righteous (ii. 29-v. 5). 3. The conclusion, Jesus is 
the Son of God and the eternal Life. 

TESTIMONIES TO THE FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN. 

Ignatius, ad Magnes. c. 6. " Being intrusted with 
the ministry of Jesus Christ, who before the ages was 
with the Father and in the end was manifested." 
1 John i. 2. 

Poly carp, ad Phil. c. 7. " For every one who doth 
not confess that Jesus Christ hath come in the flesh is 
anti-Christ." 1 John iv. 3. 

Papias, Euseb. H. E. iii. 39. "He used testimonies 
taken from the first epistle of John." Papias, it will 
be remembered, was a pupil of John himself. 

Epistle to Diognetus. " For God loved men .... 
to whom He sent His only begotten Son, to whom also 
He promised the kingdom in heaven, and to those who 

love Him will He give it How greatly should 

you love Him who first so loved you ! " 1 John iv. 9. 

Irenaeus, iii. 16. "Because that John also testified 
to us in his epistle, Little children, it is the last time ; 
and as ye have heard that antichrist shall come, even 
now are there many antichrists; whereby we know 
that it is the last time. They went out from us, but 
they were not of us; for if they had been of us, 
they would no doubt have continued with us : but 



414 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

they went out, that they might be made manifest that 
they were not all of us. Wherefore know that every 
lie is extraneous and is not of the truth. Who is a liar 
but he that denieth that Jesus is the Christ ? He is 
antichrist, that denieth the Father and the Son." "And 
again he says in the epistle, Many false prophets are 
gone out into the world. In this know the Spirit of 
God. Every spirit which confesseth that Jesus Christ 
has come in the flesh, is of God. And every spirit 
which says Jesus is not of God, is of antichrist," 
1 John iv. 1-3. " Wherefore he again says in his epis- 
tle, Every one who believeth that Jesus is the Christ, 
is born of God." 1 John v. 1. Euseb. H. E. v. 8 : "He 
also (Trenaeus) makes mention of the first epistle of 
John, bringing very many testimonies from it." 

Clement of Alexandria, Paed. iii. "But this is the 
love of God, says John, that we keep his command- 
ments, . . . and his commandments are not grievous. " 
1 John v. 3. Strom, ii. : " John also appears in his 
larger epistle, teaching the differences of sins in these 
words, If any one seeth his brother sinning a sin which 
is not unto death, he may pray and he will give him 
life. He says to those sinning not unto death, For 
there is a sin unto death. He does not say that any 
one should pray concerning that." 1 John v. 16. 

Tertullian, Scorp. a 12. "But John exhorts that 
we should lay down our lives for the brethren, denying 
that there is any fear in love." 1 John iii. 16, iv. 18. 
Adv. Prax. c. 15 : "And finally let us look upon him 
whom the apostle saw. What we have seen, says John, 
what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes 
and our hands have handled of the word of life, for the 



THE SEVEN CATHOLIC EPISTLES. 415 

word was made flesh." 1 John i. 1. c. 25: Which 
three are one (unum), not one person (unus) ; as it 
is said, I and the Father are one (unum), as to unity 
of substance not as to singleness of number." 1 John 
v. 7, 8. 

Origen, De Orat. u As John says in the catholic epis- 
tle, he is of the Devil, for the Devil sinneth from the 
beginning." 1 John iii. 8. Comment in Evan. Joan, 
xix • " John in the Catholic epistle saying these things, 
he that denieth the Father denieth also the Son ; for 
every one who denieth the Son, neither hath he the 
Father." 1 John ii. 22. ii : " But in the Catholic epis- 
tle of John himself it is said, God is light." 

Cyprian, Epist. 28. "And the apostle John .... 
in his epistle says, In this we understand that we know 
Him, if we keep His commandments. He who says 
that he knows Him, and keeps not His commandments, 
is a liar, and the truth is not in him." 1 John ii. 3, 4. 
Epist. 69 : "And also John the blessed apostle, . . . 
Ye have heard that An ti- Christ cometh, and now there 
are many Anti-Christs, whence we know it is the last 
time. They went out from us, but they were not of 
us : if they had been of us, they would no doubt have 
remained with us." 1 John ii. 18, 19. De Bon. Pat. : 
"As John the apostle teaches, he who says he 
abides in Christ ought himself to walk as He also 
walked." 1 Johnii. 6. 

Athanasius, Cont. Ar. Orat. 5. " But that the Son 
did not have beginning of existence, but was always 
in the Father before He became man, the apostle John 
declares, saying in his first epistle, That which was 
from the beginning, which we have heard, which we 



416 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, 
and our hands have handled, of the Word of life • 
for the life was manifested, and we have seen it, and 
bear witness, and shew unto you that eternal life which 
was with the Father, and was manifested unto us. 
Epist. ad Serap. : "And John writes in his epistle, by 
this we know that we abide in Him, and He in us, be- 
cause He has given unto us of His Spirit." 1 John 
iii. 24. 

THE SECOND AND THIRD EPISTLES OF JOHN. 

These two letters are very short, they are addressed 
to private individuals, and are not of any particular 
dogmatic interest. They were therefore late in getting 
into circulation as a part of the New Testament Scrip- 
tures, the ancient church exercising great caution on 
this subject, as we see in the example of 2 Peter. 
Eventually they were universally acknowledged. 

The second epistle is addressed to a Christian woman 
by the name of Kuria or Latinzed Cyria. It is a 
mistake in the English translation to render this word 
lady. The epistle begins, The Elder to the elect Cyria 
and her children, whom I love in the truth j exactly as 
the third epistle begins, The Elder to the beloved Gains 
whom I love in the truth. Both introductions are ex- 
ceedingly characteristic of the apostle John, who here 
styles himself elder, just as Peter does (1 Pet. v. 1.), on 
account of his advanced age and his position in the 
church. Who this Cyria was we have now no means 
of ascertaining ; but John exhorts her to persevere in 
Christian charity and to beware of false teachers, and 
gives her the. hope of soon receiving a visit from him. 



THE SEVEN CATHOLIC EPISTLES. 417 

Of Gaius he commends the hospitality, warns him 
against Diotrephes and commends to him Demetrius. 
There is a Gaius mentioned by Paul (Rom. xvi. 23, com- 
pare 1 Cor. i. 14) as the entertainer of himself and the 
whole church at Corinth, and therefore a very hospita- 
ble person, and the name also occurs in Acts xix. 29 
and xx. 4 ; but there is no certainty whether any of 
these were the Gaius to whom John wrote. There is 
an ancient tradition that this Gaius was a personal 
friend of the apostle, who brought his Gospel from the 
island of Patmos to the churches. Gaius is the same 
name as Caius. 

TESTIMONIES TO THE SECOND AND THIRD EPISTLES OF JOHN. 

Irenaeus, iii. 16. "And John his disciple, in the 
aforesaid epistle, commands that we should avoid them, 
saying, For many deceivers are entered into the world, 
who confess not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh. 
This is a deceiver and an antichrist. Look to your- 
selves that ye lose not those things which ye have 
wrought." 2 John 7, 8. i. 16 : "For John, the disci- 
ple of the Lord, pronounces a curse upon them, and 
wills not that we should bid them God speed, saying, 
Whoever bids them God speed is a partaker of their 
evil deeds." 2 John 4. 

Clement of Alexandria, ad Numb. " The second 
epistle of John, which is the most simple, is written 
to virgins." 

Eusebius, Dem. Evang. iii. 5. "And John also you 
will find like to Matthew, for in his epistle he does not 
mention his own name, but calls himself the elder, 
never the apostle or evangelist. And in the Gospel 



418 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

when he speaks of the disciple whom Jesus loved, he 
does not reveal himself by name. 

Epiphanius, xxxiv. "But John, the disciple of 
Christ, condemns them with a greater punishment, 
when he does not suffer us even to salute them, for who- 
ever, says he, bids them God speed, is a partaker of 
their evil deeds." 2 John 4. 

Jerome, Epist. Evang. " The son of thunder, whom 
Jesus especially loved, who drank streams of doctrine 
from the breast of the Saviour, sounds with the Gos- 
pel trumpet, The Elder to the woman elect of the Lord, 
etc., and in the other epistle, The Elder to Gains. 

THE EPISTLE OF JUDE. 

Jude was the brother of James, the author of the 
first Catholic epistle, who presided over the church at 
Jerusalem for many years ; and consequently he was 
a younger son of Mary the mother of Jesus. A very 
interesting incident respecting his. grandsons is pre- 
served to us by Eusebius (E. H. iii. 20), from the his- 
torian Hegesippus : 

" There were yet living of the family of our Lord, 
the grandchildren of Judas, called the brother of our 
Lord, according to the flesh. These' were reported as 
being of the family of David, and were brought to 
Domitian by the Evocatus. For this emperor was as 
much alarmed at the appearance of Christ as Herod. 
He put the question, whether they were of David's 
race, and they confessed that they were. - He then 
asked them what property they had, or how much 
money they owned. And both of them answered, 
that they had between them only nine thousand dena- 



THE SEVEN CATHOLIC EPISTLES. 419 

rii,* and this they had not in silver, but in the value 
of a piece of land, containing only thirty nine acres ; 
from which they raised their taxes and supported them- 
selves by their own labour. Then they also began to 
show their hands, exhibiting the hardness of their 
bodies, and the callosity formed by incessant labour 
on their hands, as evidence of their own labour. 
When asked also, respecting Christ and his kingdom, 
what was its nature, and when and where it was to 
appear, they replied, ' that it was not a temporal nor 
an earthly kingdom, but celestial and angelic ; that it 
would appear at the end of the world, when coming 
in glory he would judge the quick and dead, and give 
to every one according to his works.' Upon which, 
Domitian despising them, made no reply ; but treating 
them with contempt, as simpletons, commanded them 
to be dismissed, and by a decree ordered the persecu- 
tion to cease. Thus delivered they ruled the churches, 
both as witnesses and relatives of the Lord. When 
peace was established, they continued living even to 
the time of Trajan. Such is the statement of He- 
gesippus." 

But little is known of the life and labors of Jude. 
The epistle must have been written at a late period, 
for he mentions as historical facts already occurring, 
what Peter, in his second epistle, had predicted as still 
future at the time when he was writing (2 Pet. ii). 
The late date of the epistle and the fact that not much 
was known in the great body of the churches respect- 
ing its author, were probably the reasons why it was 
slow in coming into universal use ; though it was very 

* About 1500 dollars. 



420 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

generally acknowledged at quite an early period, as 
will be seen in the testimonies. The author, in 9, 
14, 15, refers to matters not on record in any of the 
canonical books of Scripture, and which, probably, 
like the names of Jannes and Jambres (2 Tim. iii 3), 
had been preserved till that time by tradition. It is 
true that the passage in 14, 15, is found in our 
present book of Enoch ; but as this book was not com 
pleted in the form in which we now have it till aftei 
this epistle was written, it is probable that Enoch quotes 
from Jude rather than Jude from Enoch. 

After a brief introduction (1-3) the author proceeds 
to expose the corrupt, blasphemous and wicked men, 
teachers of error and panderers to vice, who had crept 
into the churches (3-19), and concludes with the ex- 
hortation and the expression of the hope that his read- 
ers would persevere in the right way, and be finally 
received to the joys of the upper world (20-25). 

TESTIMONIES TO THE EPISTLE OF JUDE. 

Clement of Alexandria, Paed. ii. u Says Jude, For 
I wish you to know how that the Lord, having saved 
the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward de- 
stroyed them that believed not. And the angels which 
kept not their first estate, but left their own habitata- 
tion, he hath reserved in everlasting chains under 
darkness unto the judgment of the great day. And 
again, .... Woe unto them ! for they have gone in 
the way of Cain, and run greedily after the error of 
Balaam for reward, and perished in the gainsaying of 
Core. These are spots in your feasts." 

Strom, iii. u Concerning these and similar heresies 



THE SEVEN CATHOLIC EPISTLES. 421 

I think Jude spake prophetically in his epistle. Like- 
wise also these filthy dreamers and so on to this. 

And their mouth speaketh proud things." Jude 16. 

Adumb. in Ep. Jud. " Jude who wrote the Catholic 
epistle, a brother of the sons of Joseph, being very 
religious, when he knew his relationship to the Lord, 
nevertheless he did not say that he was his brother, 
but what said he ? Jude, a servant of Jesus Christ, 
as of the Lord, but a brother of James." 

Tertullian. De Cult. Tern. i. 3. "Enoch has testi- 
mony in the apostle Jude." 

Origen. Comment, in Matth. i. "Jude wrote an 
epistle indeed of few verses, but filled with efficacious 
words of heavenly grace, and says in the beginning, 
Jude a servant of Jesus Christ, but the brother of 
James." 

xv. "And indeed many of the first heavenly beings 
became last, being kept in eternal chains under dark- 
ness for the judgment of the great day." Jude 6. 

xiii. "And in the epistle of Jude, to those who are 
beloved in God the Father, and preserved and called 
in Jesus Christ." Jude 1. 

Comment, in Rom. iii. "And unless they had been 
held by this law, the divine Scripture would never 
have said concerning them, The angels also, who kept 
not their principality, but left their own habitation, 
hath God reserved, under darkness bound in Tartarus 
with eternal chains, for the judgment of the great 
day." vi. v. "In what manner then can we explain 
what the apostle Jude says in his Catholic epistle ? 
For thus he speaks, The angels also, who kept not 
their principality," etc. 



422 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

De Princip. iii. 2. "The apostle Jude in his epistle 
says, Michael the archangel disputing with Satan con- 
cerning the body of Moses." Jude 9. 

Jerome. Catal. Script. Eccl. c. 4. "Jude the broth- 
er of James, left a- short epistle, which is of the seven 
Catholic epistles." 

Epiphanius. xxvi. " As also I judge the Holy Spirit 
was moved in regard to these things in the apostle 
Jude, in the Catholic epistle, I say, which was written 
by him. But this Jude is called the brother of James 
and of the Lord." 

THE APOCRYPHAL EPISTLES. 

What are called the Apocryphal Epistles are for the 
most part very different compositions from the Apoc- 
ryphal Gospels and Acts, which have already been re- 
viewed. Those are generally either spurious or anon- 
ymous fictions and worthless, except as they occa- 
sionally embody some early Christian traditions not 
elsewhere to be found. But these epistles are, as a 
whole, the writings of the men whose names they 
bear, good and useful men and honored teachers in 
the church, the public companions of the apostles 
themselves. Hence the more common and appropri- 
ate designation of these books is, the writings of the 
Apostolic Fathers. They bear somewhat the same 
relation to the New Testament that such Apocryphal 
books a 1 Maccabees, Jesus Sirach and Wisdom of 
Solomon do to the Old. Though genuine they are 
somewhat interpolated and corrupted, and the falling 
off in tone and sentiment from the inspired to the un- 
inspired must be obvious to the dullest reader. Com- 



THE APOCRYPHAL EPISTLES. 423 

pare Barnabas for example, the fellow-missionary of 
Paul, or Hermas his personal friend, (Rom. xvi. 14), 
with the apostle himself; and it is seen at once how 
wide the difference is between an inspired writer and 
an uninspired writer, even of the same age and class. 
We admit that the epistle of Barnabas is strongly in- 
terpolated, and that the author of the Shepherd may 
be a Hermas who lived at Rome three-quarters of a 
century after Paul ; but even with this admission, the con- 
trast between the words which man's wisdom teacheth 
and the words which the Holy Ghost teacheth is suffi- 
ciently marked and strong. It is difficult to conceive 
how Irenaeus, a cotemporary of the second Hermas, 
should ascribe this work to the first Hermas and speak 
so very highly of it, if it had been a product of his 
own day. 

The writings referred to include the First Epistle of 
Clement of Rome (Phil. iv. 3) to the Corinthians, the 
Epistle of Barnabas, the Epistle of Ignatius, the Epis- 
tle of Polycarp, and the Shepherd of Hermas. These 
persons and their works are all briefly described in the 
Fourth Chapter of this Volume, to which the re Jder is 
here referred. To these may be added the Epistles of 
the Churches of Yienne and Lyons, and the epistle to 
Diognetus. 

I select for the purposes of comparison with the 
New Testament Epistles, the Epistle of Ignatius to the 
Ephesians, the Epistle of Polycarp to the Philippians, 
and the first Vision of Hermas. I take the shortest 
recension of the Epistle of Ignatius, which beyond rea- 
sonable doubt comes to us as Ignatius wrote it. Let 



424 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

the reader now, before proceeding further, turn to the 
iv chapter and examine the paragraphs on Hernias, 
Ignatius, and Polycarp. 

Hernias perhaps belongs more properly to the apoc- 
alyptic than to the epistolary Apocrypha ; but I place 
him here with Ignatius and Polycarp, and after James 
and Peter, John and Jude, that the striking contrast 
between the inspired and the uninspired, at the very 
earliest period of the church, may be the more clearly 
seen. 

THE EPISTLE OF IGNATIUS TO THE EPHESIANS. 

Ignatius, who is also called Theophorus, to the 
church which is at Ephesus in Asia ; most deservedly 
happy ; being blessed through the greatness and ful- 
ness of God the Father, and predestinated before the 
world began, that it should be always unto an enduring 
and unchangeable glory ; being united and chosen 
through his true passion, according to the will of the 
Father, and Jesus Christ our God; all happiness, by 
Jesus Christ, and his undefiled grace. I have heard of 
your name, much beloved in God ; which ye have very 
justly attained by a habit of righteousness, according 
to the faith and love which is in Jesus Christ our Sa- 
viour. How that being followers of God, and stirring 
up yourselves by the blood of Christ, ye have perfect- 
ly accomplished the work that was con-natural unto 
you. For hearing that I came bound from Syria, for 
the common name and hope, trusting through your 
prayers to fight with beasts at Rome ; that so by suf- 
fering I may become indeed the disciple of him who 



THE APOCRYPHAL EPISTLES. 425 

gave himself to God, an offering and sacrifice for us 
(ye hastened to see me). I received, therefore, in the 
name of God, your whole multitude in Onesimus. Who 
by inexpressible love is ours, but according to the flesh 
is your bishop : whom I beseech you, by Jesus Christ, 
to love ; and that you would all strive to be like unto 
him. And blessed be God, who has granted unto you, 
who are so worthy of him, to enjoy such an excellent 
bishop. For what concerns my fellow-servant Burrhus, 
and your most blessed deacon in things pertaining to 
God ; I entreat you that he may tarry longer, both for 
yours and your bishop's honor. And Crocus, also, 
worthy both of our God and you, whom I have received 
as the pattern of your love, has in all things refreshed 
me, as the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ shall also 
refresh him, together with Onesimus, and Burrhus, and 
Euplus, and Fonto, in whom I have, as to your charity, 
seen all of you. And may I always have joy of you, 
if I shall be worthy of it. It is therefore fitting that 
you should by all means glorify Jesus Christ who hath 
glorified you ; that by a uniform obedience ye may be 
perfectly joined together in the same mind, and in the 
same judgment ; and may all speak the same things 
concerning every thing : And that being subject to 
your bishop, and the presbytery, ye may be wholly 
and thoroughly sanctified. These things I prescribe 
to you, not as if I were somebody extraordinary : for 
though I am bound for his name, I am not yet perfect 
in Christ Jesus. But now I begin to learn, and I 
speak to you as fellow-disciples together with me. For 
I ought to have been stirred up by you, in faith, in 
admonition, in patience, in long suffering : but for as 



426 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

much as charity suffers me not to be silent towards 
you, I have first taken upon me to exhort you, that ye 
would all run together according to the will of God. 
For even Jesus Christ, our inseparable life, is sent by 
the will of the Father ; as the bishops, appointed unto 
the utmost bounds of the earth, are by the will of 
Jesus Christ. Wherefore it will become you to run 
together according to the will of your bishop, as also 
ye do. For your famous presbytery, worthy of God, 
is fitted as exactly to the bishop, as the strings are to 
the harp. Therefore in your concord, and agreeing 
charity, Jesus Christ is sung ; and every single person 
among you makes up the chorus : That so being all 
consonant in love, and taking up the song of God, ye 
may in perfect unity, with one voice, sing to the 
Father by Jesus Christ ; to the end that he may both 
hear you, and perceive by your works, that ye are in- 
deed the members of his Son. Wherefore it is profit- 
able for you to live in an unblamable unity, that so ye 
may always have a fellowship with God. 

For if I in this little time have had such a familiarity 
with your bishop, I mean not a carnal, but spiritual 
acquaintance with him, how much more must I think 
you happy who are so joined to him, as the church is 
to Jesus Christ, and Jesus Christ to the Father ; that so 
all things may agree in the same unity ? Let no man 
deceive himself; if a man be not within the altar, he 
is deprived of the bread of God. For if the prayer 
of one or two be of such force, as we are told, how 
much more powerful shall that of the bishop and the 
whole church be ? He therefore that does not come 
together into the same place with it, is proud, and has 



THE APOCRYPHAL EPISTLES. 427 

already condemned himself. For it is written, God 
resisteth the proud. Let us take heed therefore, that 
we do not set ourselves against the bishop, that we 
may be subject to God. The more any one sees his 
bishop silent, the more let him revere him. For whom- 
soever the master of the house sends to be over his 
own household, we ought in like manner to receive 
him, as we would do him that sent him. It is there- 
fore evident that we ought to look upon the bishop 
even as we would do upon the Lord himself. And in- 
deed Onesimus himself does greatly commend your 
good order in God : that you all live according to the 
truth, and that no heresy dwells among you. For 
neither do ye hearken to any one more than to Jesus 
Christ speaking to you in truth. For some there are 
who carry about the name of Christ in deceitfulness, 
but do things unworthy of God ; whom ye must flee, 
as ye would so many wild beasts. For they are 
ravening dogs, who bite secretly : against whom ye 
must guard yourselves, as men hardly to be cured. 
There is one physician, both fleshly and spiritual ; made 
and not made ; God incarnate ; true life in death ; both 
of Mary and of God ; first passible ; then impassible ; 
even Jesus Christ our Lord. Wherefore, let no man 
deceive you , as indeed neither are ye deceived, being 
wholly the servants of God. For inasmuch as there 
is no contention, nor strife among you, to trouble you, 
ye must needs live according to God's will. My soul 
be for yours ; and I myself the expiatory offering for 
your church of Ephesus, so famous throughout the 
world. They that are of the flesh cannot do the works 
of the spirit ; neither they that are of the spirit the 



428 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

works of the flesh. As lie that has faith cannot be an 
infidel ; nor he that is an infidel have faith. But even 
those things which ye do according to the flesh are 
spiritual ; forasmuch as ye do all things in Jesus 
Christ. Nevertheless I have heard of some who have 
passed by you, having perverse doctrine ; whom ye 
did not suffer to sow among you ; but stopped your 
ears, that ye might not receive those things that were 
sown by them ; as being the stones of the temple of 
the Father, prepared for his building ; and drawn up 
on high by the cross of Christ, as by an engine. Using 
the Holy Ghost as the rope ; your faith being your 
support; and your charity the way that leads unto 
God. Ye are, therefore, with all your companions in 
the same journey, full of God ; his spiritual temples, 
full of Christ, full of holiness; adorned in all things 
with the commands of Christ. In whom also I rejoice 
that I have been thought worthy by this present epistle 
to converse, and joy together with you ; that with re- 
spect to the other life, ye love nothing but God only. 
Pray also without ceasing for other men ; for there 
is hope of repentance in them, that they may attain 
unto God ; let them therefore at least be instructed by 
your works, if they will be no other way. Be ye mild 
at their anger ; humble at their boasting : to their 
blasphemies, return your prayers : to their error, your 
firmness in the faith : when they are cruel, be ye gen- 
tle ; not endeavoring to imitate their ways. Let us 
be their brethren in all kindness and moderation, but 
let us be followers of the Lord : for who was ever 
more unjustly used ? more destitute ? more despised ? 
That so no herb of the Devil may be found in you ; 



THE APOCRYPHAL EPISTLES. 429 

but ye may remain in all holiness and sobriety, both 
of body and spirit, in Christ Jesus. The last times are 
come upon us : let us therefore be very reverent, and 
fear the long-suffering of God, that it be not to us 
unto condemnation. For let us either fear the wrath 
that is to come, or let us love the grace that we at 
present enjoy ; that by the one, or other, of these 
we may be found in Christ Jesus unto true life. Be- 
sides him, let nothing be worthy of you ; for whom 
also I bear about these bonds, those spiritual jewels, 
in which I would to God that I might arise through 
your prayers. Of which I entreat you to make me 
always partaker, that I may be found in the lot of the 
Christians of Ephesus, who have always agreed with 
the apostles, through the power of Jesus Christ. I 
know both who I am, and to whom I write : I, a per- 
son condemned ; ye, such as have obtained mercy ; I, 
exposed to danger; ye, confirmed against danger. Ye 
are the passage of those that are killed for God ; the 
Companions of Paul in the mysteries of the Gospel; 
the holy, the martyr, the deservedly most happy Paul ; 
at whose feet may I be found, when I shall have at- 
tained unto God ; who throughout all his epistles makes 
mention of you in Christ Jesus. Let it be your care, 
therefore, to come more fully together, to the praise 
and glory of God. For when ye meet fully together 
in the same place, the powers of the devil are de- 
stroyed, and his mischief is dissolved by the unity of 
your faith. And indeed, nothing is better than peace, 
by which all war, both spiritual and earthly, are abol- 
ished. Of all which nothing is hid from you, if ye 
have perfect faith and charity in Christ Jesus, which 



430 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

are the beginning and end of life. For the beginning 
is faith ; the end charity. And these two, joined to- 
gether, are of God : but all other things which con- 
cern a holy life, are the consequences of these. No 
man professing a true faith, sinneth ; neither does he 
who has charity, hate any. The tree is made manifest 
by its fruit : so they who profess themselves to be 
Christians are known by what they do. For Christian- 
ity is not the work of an outward profession; but 
shows itself in the power of faith, if a man be found 
faithful unto the end. It is better for a man to hold 
his peace, and be, than to say, he is a Christian, and 
not to be. It is good to teach, if what he says, he 
does likewise. There is therefore one Master who 
spake, and it was done ; and even those things which 
he did without speaking, are worthy of the Father. 
He that possesses the word of Jesus, is truly able to 
hear his very silence, that he may be perfect; and 
both do according to what he speaks, and be known 
of those things of which he is silent. There is nothing 
hid from God, but even our secrets are nigh unto him. 
Let us therefore do all things, as becomes those who 
have God dwelling in them ; that we may be his tem- 
ples, and he may be our God ; as also he is, and will 
manifest himself before our faces, by those things for 
which we justly love him. 

Be not deceived, my brethren : those that corrupt 
families by adultery, shall not inherit the kingdom of 
God. If therefore they who do this according to the 
flesh, have suffered death, how much more shall he 
die, who by his wicked doctrine corrupts the faith of 
God, for which Christ was crucified ? He that is thus 



THE APOCRYPHAL EPISTLES. 431 

defiled, shall depart into unquenchable fire, and so 
also shall he that hearkens to him. For this cause did 
the Lord suffer the ointment to be poured on his head ; 
that he might breathe the breath of immortality into 
his church. Be not ye therefore anointed with the 
evil savor of the doctrine of the prince of this world : 
let him not take you captive from the life that is set 
before you. And why are we not all wise ; seeing we 
have received the knowledge of God, which is Jesus 
Christ ? Why do we suffer ourselves foolishly to per- 
ish ; not considering the gift which the Lord has truly 
sent to us ? Let my life be sacrificed for the doctrine 
of the cross ; which is indeed a scandal to the unbe- 
lievers, but to us is salvation and life eternal. Where 
is the wise man ? Where is the disputer ? Where is 
the boasting of those who are called wise ? For our 
God, Jesus Christ, was according to the dispensation of 
God, conceived in the womb of Mary, of the seed of 
David, by the Holy Ghost : he was born, and baptized, 
that through his passion he might purify water, to the 
washing away of sin. Now the virginity of Mary, and 
he who was born of her, was kept secret from the 
prince of this world; as was also the death of our 
Lord ; three of the mysteries the most spoken of 
throughout the world, yet done in secret by God. 
How then was our Saviour manifested to the world ? 
A star shone in heaven beyond all the other stars, and 
its light was inexpressible, and its novelty struck ter- 
ror into men's minds. All the rest of the stars, to- 
gether with the sun and moon, were the chorus to this 
star; but that sent out its light exceedingly above 
them all. And men began to be troubled to think 



432 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE 

whence this new star came, so unlike to all the others. 
H'ence all the power of magic became dissolved ; and 
every bond of wickedness was destroyed ; men's igno- 
rance was taken away ; and the old kingdom abolish- 
ed ; God himself appearing in the form of a man, for 
the renewal of eternal life. From thence began what 
God had prepared : from thenceforth things were dis- 
turbed ; forasmuch as he designed to abolish death. 
But if Jesus Christ shall give me grace through your 
prayers, and it be his will, I purpose in a second epis- 
tle, which I will suddenly write unto you, to manifest 
to you more fully the dispensation of which I have 
now begun to speak, unto the new man, which is Jesus 
Christ ; both in his faith, and charity ; in his suffering 
and in his resurrection. Especially if the Lord shall 
make known unto me, that ye all by name come to- 
gether in common in one faith, and in one Jesus Christ ; 
who was of the race of David, according to the flesh ; 
the Son of man and Son of God ; obeying your bishop 
and the presbytery with an entire affection ; breaking 
one and the same bread, which is the medicine of im- 
mortality ; our antidote that we should not die, but 
live forever in Christ Jesus. My soul be for yours, 
and theirs whom ye have sent, to the glory of God ; 
even unto Smyrna, from whence also I write to 
you ; giving thanks unto the Lord, and loving Poly carp 
even as I do you. Remember me, as Jesus Christ does 
remember you. Pray for the church which is in Syria, 
from whence I am carried bound to Rome ; being the 
least of all the faithful which are there, as I have been 
thought worthy to be found to the glory of God. 
Fare ye well in God the Father, and in Jesus Christ, 
our common hope. Amen, 



THE APOCRYPHAL EPISTLES. 433 



THE EPISTLE OF POLYCARP TO THE PHILIPPIANS. 

Polyearp, and the presbyters that are with him, to 
the church of God which is at Philippi ; mercy unto 
you, and peace, from God Almighty, and the Lord 
Jesus Christ, our Saviour, be multiplied. I rejoiced 
greatly with you in our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye re- 
ceived the images of a true love, and accompanied as 
it behoves you, those who were in bonds becoming 
saints ; which are the crowns of such as are truly 
chosen by God and our Lord : as also that the root of 
the faith which was preached from ancient times, re- 
mains firm in you to this day ; and brings forth fruit 
to our Lord Jesus Christ, who suffered himself to be 
brought even to the death for our sins. Whom God 
hath raised up, having loosed the pains of death. 
Whom having not seen, ye love ; in whom, though 
now ye see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy 
unspeakable and full of glory. Into which many de- 
sire to enter ; knowing that by grace ye are saved ; 
not by works, but by the will of God through Jesus 
Christ. Wherefore, girding up the loins of your minds ; 
serve the Lord with fear, and in truth laying aside all 
empty and vain speech, and the error of many ; be- 
lieving in him that raised up our Lord Jesus Christ 
from the dead, and hath given him glory, and a throne 
at his right hand. To whom all things are made sub- 
ject, both that are in heaven, and that are in earth ; 
whom every living creature shall worship ; who shall 
come to be the judge of the quick and the dead ; 
whose blood God shall require of them that believe 
not in him. But he that raised up Christ from the 
28 



434 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

dead, shall also raise up us in like manner, if we do 
his will, and walk according to his commandments; 
and love those things which he loved : abstaining from 
all unrighteousness ; inordinate affection, and love of 
money; from evil speaking; false witness; not ren- 
dering evil for evil, or railing for railing, or striking 
for striking, or cursing for cursing. But remember 
what the Lord has taught us, saying, Judge not, that 
ye shall not be judged ; forgive, and ye shall be for- 
given ; be ye merciful, and ye shall obtain mercy ; for 
with the same measure that ye mete withal, it shall be 
measured to you again. And again, that blessed are the 
poor, and they that are persecuted for righteousness' 
sake ; for theirs is the kingdom of God. 

These things, my brethren, I took not the liberty of 
myself to write unto you concerning righteousness, 
but you yourselves before encouraged me to do it. 
For neither can I, nor any other such as I am, come 
up to the wisdom of the blessed and renowned Paul ; 
who, being himself in person with those who then 
lived, did with all exactness and soundness teach the 
word of truth ; and being gone from you, wrote an 
epistle to you. Into which if you look, you will be 
able to edify yourselves in the faith that has been de- 
livered unto you ; which is the mother of us all ; being 
followed with hope, and led on by a general love, both 
towards God and towards Christ, and towards our 
neighbour. For if any man has these things, he 
has fulfilled the law of righteousness : for he that has 
charity is far from all sin. But the love of money is 
the root of all evil. Knowing therefore that as we 
brought nothing into this world, so neither may we 



TEE APOCRYPHAL EPISTLES. 435 

carry anything out; let us arm ourselves with the 
armor of righteousness. And teach ourselves first to 
walk according to the commandments of the Lord; 
and then our wives to walk likewise according to the 
faith that is given to them ; in charity, and in purity ; 
loving their own husbands with all sincerity, and all 
others alike with all temperance ; and to bring up their 
children in the instruction and fear of the Lord. The 
widows likewise teach that they be sober as to what 
concerns the faith of the Lord ; praying always for all 
men ; being far from all detraction, evil speaking, false 
witness ; from covetousness, and from all evil. Know- 
ing that they are the altars of God, who sees all blem- 
ishes, and from whom nothing is hid ; who searches 
out the very reasonings, and thoughts, and secrets of 
our hearts. Knowing, therefore, that God is not 
mocked, we ought to walk worthy both of his com- 
mand and of his glory. Also the deacons must be 
blameless before him, as the ministers of God in Christ, 
and not of men. Not false accusers; not double- 
tongued ; not lovers of money ; but moderate in all 
things ; compassionate, careful ; walking according to 
the truth of the Lord, who was the servant of all. 
Whom if we please in this present world, we shall also 
be made partakers of that which is to come, according 
as he hath promised us, that he will raise us up from 
the dead ; and that if we shall walk worthy of him, 
we shall also reign together with him, if we believe. 
In like manner the younger men must be unblamable 
in all things ; above all, taking care of their purity, 
and to restrain themselves from all evil. For it is good 
to be cut off from the lusts that are in the world ; be- 



436 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

cause every such lust warreth against the spirit : and 
neither fornicators, nor effeminate, nor abusers of them- 
selves with mankind, shall inherit the kingdom of God; 
nor they who do such things as are foolish and unrea- 
sonable. Wherefore ye must needs abstain from all 
these things ; being subject to the priests and deacons, 
as unto God and Christ. The virgins admonish to 
walk in a spotless and pure conscience. And let the 
elders be compassionate and merciful towards all, turn- 
ing them from their errors ; seeking out those that are 
weak ; not forgetting the widows, the fatherless, and 
the poor ; but always providing what is good both in 
the sight of God and man. Abstaining from all wrath, 
respect of persons, and unrighteous judgment ; and 
especially being free from all covetousness. Not easy 
to believe anything against any ; not severe in judg- 
ment; knowing that we are all debtors in point 
of sin. If therefore we pray to the Lord that he 
would forgive us, we ought also to forgive others , for 
we are all in the sight of our Lord and God ; and must 
all stand before the judgment seat of Christ; and 
shall every one give an account of himself. Let us 
therefore serve him in fear, and with all reverence as 
both himself hath commanded, and as the apostles 
who have preached the Gospel unto us, and the proph- 
ets who have foretold the coming of our Lord, have 
taught us : being zealous of what is good ; abstaining 
from all offence, and from false brethren ; and from 
those who bear the name of Christ in hypocrisy ; who 
deceive vain men. 

For whosoever does not confess that Jesus Christ is 
come in the flesh, he is Antichrist : and whoever does 



THE APOCRYPHAL EPISTLES. 437 

not confess his suffering upon the cross, is from the 
Devil. And whosoever perverts the oracles of the 
Lord to his own lusts ; and says that there shall nei- 
ther be any resurrection, nor judgment, he is the first- 
born of Satan. Wherefore, leaving the vanity of 
many, and their false doctrines ; let us return to the 
word that was delivered to us from the beginning ; 
Watching unto prayer; and persevering in fasting: 
With supplication beseeching the all-seeing God not 
to lead us into temptation ; as the Lord hath said ; 
The spirit truly is willing, but the flesh is weak. Let 
us therefore, without ceasing, hold steadfastly to him 
who is our hope, and the earnest of our righteousness, 
even Jesus «Christ ; Who his own self bear our sins in 
his own body on the tree ; who did not sin, neither 
was guile found in his mouth. But suffered all for us 
that we might live through him. Let us therefore im- 
itate his patience ; and if we suffer for his name, let us 
glorify him ; for this example he has given us by him- 
self, and so have we believed. Wherefore I exhort 
all of you that ye obey the word of righteousness, and 
exercise all patience ; which ye have seen set forth be- 
fore your eyes, not only in the blessed Ignatius, and 
Zozimus, and Rufus ; but in others among yourselves ; 
and in Paul himself, and the rest of the Apostles : Be- 
ing confident of this, that all these have not run in 
vain ; but in faith and righteousness, and are gone to 
the place that was due to them from the Lord ; with 
whom also they suffered. For they loved not this 
present world; but him who died, and was raised 
again by God for us. Stand therefore in these things 
and follow the example of the Lord ; being firm and 



438 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

immutable in the faith, lovers of the brotherhood, lovers 
of one another ; companions together in the truth, be- 
ing kind and gentle toward each other, despising none. 
When it is in your power to do good, defer it not ; for 
charity delivereth from death. Be all of you subject 
one to another; having your conversation honest 
among the Gentiles ; that by your good works, both 
ye yourselves may receive praise, and the Lord may 
not be blasphemed through you. But wo be to him 
by whom the name of the Lord is blasphemed. There- 
fore teach all men sobriety ; in which do ye also ex- 
ercise yourselves. 

I am greatly afflicted for Valens, who was once a 
presbyter among you ; that he should so little under- 
stand the place that was given to him in the church. 
Wherefore I admonish you that ye abstain from cove- 
tousness ; and that ye be chaste, and true of speech. 
Keep yourselves from all evil. For he that in these 
things cannot govern, himself, how shall he be able to 
prescribe them to another ? If a man does not keep 
himself from covetousness, he shall be polluted with 
idolatry, and be judged as if he were a Gentile. But 
who of you are ignorant of the judgment of God ? 
Do we not know that the saints shall judge the world, 
as Paul teaches ? But I have neither perceived nor 
heard any thing of this kind in you, among whom the 
blessed Paul laboured ; and who are named in the be- 
ginning of his Epistle. For he glories of you in all 
the churches who then only knew God ; for we did 
not then know him. Wherefore, my brethren, I am 
exceedingly sorry both for him, and for his wife ; to 
whom God grant a true repentance. And be ye also 



THE APOCRYPHAL EPISTLES. 439 

moderate upon this occasion ; and look not upon such 
as enemies, but call them back as suffering and erring 
members, that ye may save your whole body : for by 
so doing, ye shall edify your own selves. For I trust 
that ye are well exercised in the Holy Scriptures, and 
that nothing is hid from you : but at present it is not 
granted unto me to practise that which is written, Be 
angry and sin not ; and again, Let not the sun go 
down upon your wrath. Blessed is he that believeth 
and remembereth these things ; which also I trust you 
do. Now the God and Father of our Lord Jesus 
Christ, and he himself who is our everlasting high- 
priest, the Son of God, even Jesus Christ, build you 
up in faith and in truth, and in all meekness and leni- 
ty ; in patience and long-suffering, in forbearance and 
chastity ; and grant unto you a lot and portion among 
his saints ; and us with you, and to all that are under 
the heavens, who shall believe in our Lord Jesus Christ, 
and in his Father who raised him from the dead. Pray 
for all the saints : pray also for kings, and all that are 
in authority ; and for those who persecute you, and 
hate you, and for the enemies of the cross ; that your 
fruit may be manifest in all ; and that ye may be per- 
fect in Christ. Ye wrote to me, both ye, and also Ig- 
natius, that if any one went from hence into Syria, he 
should bring your letters with him ; which also I will 
take care of, as soon as I shall have a convenient op- 
portunity ; either by myself, or him whom I shall send 
upon your account. The epistle of Ignatius which 
he wrote unto us, together with what others of his 
have come to our hands, we have sent to you, accord- 
ing to your order ; which are subjoined to this epistle : 



440 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

By which ye may be greatly profited ; for they treat 
of faith and patience, and of all things that pertain to 
edification in the Lord Jesus. What you know cer- 
tainly of Ignatius, and those that are with him, signify 
unto us. These things have I written unto you by 
Crescens, whom by this present epistle I have recom- 
mended to you, and do now again commend. For he 
has had his conversation without blame among us ; and 
I suppose also with you. Ye will also have regard 
unto his sister, when she shall come unto you. Be ye 
safe in the Lord Jesus Christ ; and in favor with all 
yours. Amen. 

THE SHEPHERD OF HERMAS. 

FROM THE FIRST BOOK OF HERMAS CALLED VISIONS. 

He who had bred me up sold a certain young maid 
at Rome ; whom when I saw many years after, I re- 
membered her, and began to love her as a sister. It 
happened some time afterwards, that I saw her wash- 
ing at the river Tyber, and I reached out my hand to 
her, and led her away from the river. And when I 
saw her, I thought with myself, saying, How happy 
should I be if I had such a wife, both for beauty and 
manners ! This I thought with myself ; nor did I think 
any thing more. But not long after, as I was walking, 
and musing on these thoughts, I began to honor this 
creature of God, thinking with myself how noble and 
beautiful she was. And when I had walked a little, 1 
fell asleep. And the Spirit caught me away, and car* 
ried me through a certain place toward the right hand^ 
through which no man could pass. It was a place 
among rocks, very steep, and unpassable for water. 
When I was past this place, I came into a plain ; and 




THE HOLY SEPULOII1SE 



THE APOCRYPHAL EPISTLES. 441 

there, falling down upon my knees, I began to pray 
unto the Lord, and to confess my sins. And as I was 
praying, the heaven was opened, and I saw the woman 
whom I had coveted, saluting me from heaven, and 
saying, Hernias, hail ! and I, looking upon her, an- 
swered, Lady, what dost thou do here ? She answered 
me, I am taken up hither to accuse thee of sin before 
the Lord. Lady, said I, Wilt thou convince me ? No, 
said she ; but hear the words which I am about to 
speak unto thee. God, who dwelleth in heaven, and 
hath made all things out of nothing, and hath multi- 
plied them for his holy church's sake, is angry with 
thee, because thou hast sinned against me. And I an- 
swering said unto her, Lady, if I have sinned against 
thee, tell me where, or in what place ; or when did I 
ever speak an unseemly or dishonest Word unto thee ? 
Have I not always esteemed thee as a lady ? Have I 
not always reverenced thee as a sister ? Why then dost 
thou imagine these wicked things against me ? Then 
she, smiling upon me, said, The desire of naughtiness 
has risen up in thy heart. Does it not seem to thee to 
be an ill thing for a righteous man to have an evil de- 
sire rise up in his heart ? It is indeed a sin, and that 
a very great one, to such a one ; for a righteous man 
thinketh that which is righteous. And whilst he does 
so, and walketh uprightly, he shall have the Lord in 
heaven favorable unto him in all his business. But 
as for those who think wickedly in their hearts, they 
take to themselves death and captivity ; and especially 
those who love this present world, and glory in their 
riches, and regard not the good things that are to 
come ; their souls wander up and down, and know not 
where to fix. Now this is the case of such as are 



442 BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

double-minded, who trust not in the Lord, and despise 
and neglect their own life. But do thou pray unto 
the Lord, and he will heal thy sins, and the sins of thy 
whole house, and of all his saints. As soon as she had 
spoken these words, the heavens were shut, and I re- 
mained utterly swallowed up with sadness and fear ; 
and said within myself, If this be laid against me for 
sin, how can I be saved ? Or how shall I ever be able 
to entreat the Lord for my many and great sins? 
With what words shall I beseech him to be merciful 
unto me ? As I was thinking over these things, and 
meditating in myself upon them, behold a chair was 
set over against me of the whitest wool, as bright as 
snow. And there came an old woman in a bright gar- 
ment, having a book in her hand, and sat alone, and 
saluted me, saying, Hermas, hail ! And I, being full 
of sorrow, and weeping, answered, Hail, Lady ! And 
she said unto me, Why art thou sad, Hermas, who wast 
wont to be patient, and modest, and always cheerful ? 
I answered, and said to her, Lady, a reproach has been 
laid to my charge by an excellent woman, who tells 
me that I have sinned against her. She replied, Far 
be any such thing from the servant of God. But it 
may be the desire of her has risen up in thy heart ? 
For indeed such a thought maketh the servants of God 
guilty of sin ; nor ought such a detestable thought to 
be in the servants of God; nor should he who is ap- 
proved by the Spirit desire that which is evil ; but es- 
pecially Hermas, who contains himself from all wicked 
lusts, and is full of all simplicity, and of great inno- 
cence. Nevertheless the Lord is not so much angry 
with thee for thine own sake, as upon the account of 
thy house, which has committed wickedness against 



THE APOCRYPHAL EPISTLES. 443 

the Lord, and against their parents. And for that out 
of thy fondness towards thy sons, thou hast not ad- 
monished thy house, but hast permitted them to live 
wickedly ; for this cause the Lord is angry with thee : 
but he will heal all the evils that are done in thy house. 
For through their sins and iniquities, thou art wholly 
consumed in secular affairs. But now the mercy of 
God hath taken compassion upon thee, and upon thy 
house, and hath greatly comforted thee. Only as for 
thee, do not wander, but be of an even mind, and 
comfort thy house. As the workman, bringing forth 
his work, offers it to whomsoever he pleases ; so shalt 
thou, by teaching every day what is just, cut off a 
great sin. Wherefore cease not to admonish thy sons, 
for the Lord knows that they will repent with all their 
heart, and they shall be written in the book of life. 
And when she had said this, she added unto me, Wilt 
thou hear me read ? — I answered her, Lady, I will. 
Hear, then, said she ; and opening the book, she read, 
gloriously, greatly, and wonderfully, such things as I 
could not keep in my memory. For they were terri- 
ble words, such as no man could bear. Howbeit I 
committed her last words to my remembrance; for 
they were but few, and of great use to us. Behold 
the mighty Lord, who by his invisible power, and with 
his excellent wisdom, made the world, and by his glo- 
rious counsel beautified his creature, and with the 
word of his strength fixed the heaven, and founded 
the earth upon the waters ; and by his powerful virtue 
established his Holy Church, which he hath blessed : 
Behold, he will remove the heavens, and the moun- 
tains, the hills, and the seas ; and all things shall be 



444 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

made plain for his elect ; that he may render unto them 
the promise which he hath promised with much honor 
and joy ; if so be that they shall keep the command- 
ments of God, which they have received with great 
faith. And when she had made an end of reading, 
she rose out of the chair ; and behold four young men 
came, and carried the chair to the east. And she 
called me unto her, and touched my breast, and said 
unto me, Did my reading please thee ? — I answered, 
Lady, these last things please me ; but what went be- 
fore was severe and hard. She said unto me, These 
last things are for the righteous, but the foregoing for 
the revolters and heathen. And as she was talking 
with me, two men appeared, and took her upon their 
shoulders, and went to the east where the chair was. 
And she went cheerfully away ; and as she was going, 
said unto me, Hermas, be of good cheer. 

As I was on the way to Cuma, about the same time 
that I went the year before, I began to call to mind 
the vision I formerly had. And again the Spirit car- 
ried me away, and brought me into the same place, in 
which I had been the year before. And when I was 
come into the place, I fell down upon my knees, and 
began to pray unto the Lord, and to glorify his name, 
that he had esteemed me worthy, and had manifested 
unto me my former sins. And when I arose from 
prayer, behold I saw over against me the old woman 
whom I had seen the last year, walking, and reading 
in a certain book. And she said unto me, Canst thou 
tell these things to the elect of God ? — I answered, 
and said unto her, Lady, I cannot retain so many 
things in my memory, but give me the book, and I 



THE APOCRYPHAL EPISTLES. 445 

will write them down. Take it, says she, and see that 
thou restore it again to me. As soon as I had received 
it, I went aside into a certain place of the field, and 
transcribed every letter, for I found no syllables. And 
as soon as I had finished what was written in the book, 
the book was suddenly caught out of my hands, but 
by whom I saw not. After fifteen days, when I had 
fasted, and entreated the Lord with all earnestness, 
the knowledge of the writing was revealed unto me. 
Now the writing was this : Thy seed, Hermas ! have 
sinned against the Lord, and have betrayed their pa- 
rents, through their great wickedness. And they have 
been called the betrayers of their parents, and have 
gone on in their treachery. And now have they ad- 
ded lewdness to their other sins, and the pollutions of 
naughtiness : thus have they filled up the measure of 
their iniquities. But do thou upbraid thy sons with 
all these words ; and thy wife, which shall be thy sis- 
ter ; and let her refrain her tongue with which she 
calumniates. For when she shall hear these things, 
she will refrain herself, and shall obtain mercy. And 
they also shall be instructed when thou shalt have 
reproached them with these words, which the Lord 
hath commanded to be revealed unto thee. Then shall 
their sins be forgiven which they have heretofore com- 
mitted, and the sins of all the saints, who have sinned 
even unto this day ; if they shall repent with all their 
hearts, and remove all doubts out of their hearts. 
For the Lord hath sworn by his glory concerning his 
elect, having determined this very time, that if any 
one shall even now sin, he shall not be saved. For 
the repentance of the righteous has its end : the days 



446 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

of repentance are fulfilled to all the saints ; but to the 
heathen, there is repentance even unto the last day. 
Thou shalt therefore say to those who are over the 
church ; that they order their ways in righteousness ; 
that they may fully receive the promise with much 
glory. Stand fast, therefore, ye that work righteous- 
ness ; and continue to do it, that your departure may 
be with the holy angels. Happy are ye, as many as 
shall endure the great trial that is at hand, and whoso- 
ever shall not deny his life. For the Lord hath sworn 
by his Son, that whoso denyeth his son and him, being 
afraid of his life, he will also deny him in the world 
that is to come. But those who shall never deny him, 
he will of his exceeding great mercy be favourable 
unto them. But thou, Hermas ! remember not the 
evils which thy sons have done, neither neglect thy 
sister, but take care that they amend of their former 
sins. For they will be instructed by this doctrine, if 
thou shalt not be mindful of what they have done 
wickedly. For the remembrance of evils worketh 
death ; but the forgetting of them, life eternal. But 
thou, Hermas ! hast undergone a great many worldly 
troubles for the offences of thy house, because thou 
hast neglected them, as things that did not belong unto 
thee : and thou art wholly taken up with thy great 
business. Nevertheless for this cause shalt thou be 
saved, that thou hast not departed from the living 
God ; and thy simplicity and singular continency shall 
preserve thee, if thou shalt continue in them. Yea, 
they shall save all such as do such things ; and walk 
in innocence and simplicity. They who are of this 
kind, shall prevail against all impiety, and continue 
unto life eternal. 



THE APOCRYPHAL EPISTLES. 4.47 



FROM THE SECOND BOOK OF HERMAS CALLED COMMANDS. 

When I had prayed at home, and was sat down 
upon the bed, a certain man came into me with a rev- 
erend look, in the habit of a shepherd, clothed with 
a white cloak, having his bag upon his back, and his 
staff in his hand, and saluted me. I returned his salu- 
tation ; and immediately he sat down by me, and said 
unto me, I am sent by that venerable messenger, that 
I should dwell with thee all the remaining days of thy 
life. But I thought that he was come to try me, and 
said unto him Who art thou ? For I know to whom 
I am committed. He said unto me, Do you not know 
me ? I answered, No. I am, said he, that shepherd, 
to whose care you are delivered. Whilst he was yet 
speaking, his shape was changed ; and when I knew 
that it was he to whom I was committed, I was ashamed 
and a sudden fear came upon me, and I was utterly 
overcome with sadness, because I had spoken so fool- 
ishly unto him. But he said unto me, Be not ashamed, 
but receive strength in thy mind, through the com- 
mands which I am about to deliver unto thee. For, 
said he, I am sent to show unto thee all those things 
again, which thou hast seen before ; but especially 
such of them as may be of most use unto thee. And 
first of all write my Commands and Similitudes ; the 
rest thou shalt so write as I shall show unto thee. 
But I therefore bid the first of all write my Commands 
and Similitudes, that by often reading of them, thou 
mayest the more easily keep them in memory. Where- 
upon I wrote his Commands and Similitudes, as he 
bade me. Which things if, when you have heard ye 



448 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

shall observe to do them, and shall walk according to 
them, and exercise yourselves in them, with a pure 
mind, ye shall receive from the Lord those things 
which he has promised unto you. But if, having heard 
them, ye shall not repent, but shall still go on to 
add to your sins, ye shall be punished by him. All 
these things that shepherd, the angel of repentance, 
commanded me to write. 

First of all, believe that there is but one God, who 
created and framed all things of nothing into being. 
He comprehends all things, and is only immense, not 
to be comprehended by any. Who can neither be 
defined by any words, nor conceived by the mind. 
Therefore believe in him, and fear him ; and fearing 
him, abstain from all evil. Keep these things, and 
cast all lust and iniquity far from thee; and put on 
righteousness ; and thou shalt live to God, if thou shalt 
keep his commandments. 

He said unto me, Be innocent, and without disguise ; 
so shalt thou be like an infant who knows no malice, 
which destroys the life of man. Especially see that 
thou speak evil of none ; nor willingly hear any one 
speak evil of any. For if thou observest not this, 
thou also who hearest, shalt be partaker of the sin of 
him that speaketh evil by believing the slander, and 
thou also shalt have sin; because thou believedst 
him that spake evil of thy brother. Detraction is a 
pernicious thing ; an inconstant, evil spirit ; that never 
continues in peace, but is always in discord. Where- 
fore refrain thyself from it ; and keep peace evermore 
with thy brother. Put on a holy constancy, in which 
there are no sins, but all is full of joy ; and do good 



THE APOCRYPHAL EPISTLES. 449 

of thy labours. Give without distinction to all that 
are in want ; not doubting to whom thou givest. But 
give to all ; for God will have us give to all, of all 
his own gifts. They therefore that receive shall give 
an account to God, both wherefore they receive, and 
for what end. And they that receive without a real 
need, shall give an account for it ; but he that gives 
shall be innocent : for he has fulfilled his duty as he 
received it from God ; not making any choice to whom 
he should give, and to whom not. And this service 
he did with simplicity, and to the glory of God. Keep 
therefore this command according as I have delivered 
it unto thee ; that thy repentance may be found to be 
sincere, and that good may come to thy house ; and 
thou mayest have a pure heart. 

Moreover he said unto me, Love truth and let all 
the speech be true which proceeds out of thy mouth ; 
that the spirit which the Lord hath given to dwell in 
thy flesh may be found true towards all men ; and 
the Lord be glorified, who hath given such a spirit 
unto thee ; because God is true in all his words, and 
in him there is no lie. They therefore that lie, deny 
the Lord ; and become robbers of the Lord ; not ren- 
dering to God what they received from him. For 
they received the Spirit free from lying : if therefore 
they make that a liar, they defile what was committed 
to them by the Lord, and become deceivers. When 
I heard this I wept bitterly. And when he saw me 
weeping, he said unto me, Why weepest thou ? And 
I said, Because, sir, I doubt whether I can be saved. 
He asked me, Wherefore ? I replied, Because, sir, I 
never spake a true word in my life ; but always lived 
29 



450 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

in dissimulation, and affirmed a lie for truth to all men ; 
and no man contradicted me, but all gave credit to 
my words. How then can I live, seeing I have done 
in this manner ? And he said unto me, Thou thinkest 
well and truly, For thou oughtest, as the servant of 
God, to have walked in the truth, and not have joined 
an evil conscience with the Spirit of truth ; nor have 
grieved the holy and true Spirit of God. And I replied 
unto him, Sir, I never before hearkened so diligently 
to these things. He answered, Now thou hearest 
them : take care from henceforth, that even those things 
which thou hast formerly spoken falsely for the sake 
of thy business, may, by thy present truth, receive 
credit. For even those things may be credited, if for 
the time to come thou shalt speak the truth ; and by 
so doing thou mayest attain unto life. And whosoever 
shall hearken unto this command, and do it, and shall 
depart from all lying, he shall live unto God. 

Furthermore, said he, I command thee, that thou 
keep thyself chaste ; and that thou suffer not any 
thought of any other marriage, or of fornication, to 
enter into thy heart : for such a thought produces a 
great sin. But be thou at all times mindful of the 
Lord, and thou shalt never sin. For if such an evil 
thought should arise in thy heart, thou shouldest be 
guilty of a great sin ; and they who do such things, 
follow the way of death. Look therefore to thyself, 
and keep thyself from such a thought : for where 
chastity remains in the heart of a righteous man, there 
an evil thought ought never to arise. And I said unto 
him, Sir, suffer me to speak a little to you. He bade 
me say on. And I answered, Sir, if a man that is 



THE APOCRYPLAL EPISTLES. 451 

faithful in the Lord, shall have a wife, and shall catch 
her in adultery, doth a man sin that continueth to live 
still with her ? And he said unto me, As long as he 
is ignorant of her sin, he commits no fault in living 
with her : but if a man shall know his wife to have 
offended, and she shall not repent of her sin, but go 
on still in her fornication, and a man shall continue 
nevertheless to live with her, he shall become guilty 
of her sin, and partake with her in her adultery. And 
I said unto him, What therefore is to be done, if the 
woman continues on in her sin ? he answered, Let her 
husband put her away, and let him continue by him- 
self. But if he shall put away his wife and marry an- 
other, he also doth commit adultery. And I said, 
What if the woman that is so put away, shall repent, 
and be willing to return to her husband ? shall she not 
be received by him ? He said unto me, Yes ; and if 
her husband shall not receive her, he will sin ; and 
commit a great offence against himself: but he ought 
to receive the offender if she repents ; only not often. 
For to the servants of God there is but one repent- 
ance. And for this cause a man that putteth away his 
wife ought not to take another, because she may re- 
pent. This act is alike both in the man and in the 
woman. Now they commit adultery, not only who 
pollute their flesh, but who also make an image. If 
therefore a woman perseveres in anything of this kind, 
and repents not, depart from her, and live not with her : 
otherwise thou also shall be partaker of her sin. 



452 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 



FEOM THE THIRD BOOK OF HERMAS CALLED SIMILITUDES. 

After a few days I saw the same person that before 
talked with me, in the same field, in which I had seen 
those shepherds. And he said unto me, what seekest 
thou ? Sir, said I, I come to entreat you that you 
would command the shepherd, who is the minister of 
punishment, to depart out of my house, because he 
greatly afflicts me. And he answered, it is necessary 
for thee to endure inconveniences and vexations ; for 
so that good angel hath commanded concerning thee, 
because he would try thee. Sir, said I, what so great 
offence have I committed, that I should be delivered 
to this messenger ? Hearken, said he ; thou art indeed 
guilty of many sins, yet not so many that thou shouldest 
be delivered to this messenger. But thy house hath 
committed many sins and offences, and therefore that 
good messenger, being grieved at their doings, com- 
manded that for some time thou shouldest suffer afflic- 
tion ; that they may both repent of what they have 
done, and may wash themselves from all the lusts of 
this present world. When therefore they shall have 
repented, and be purified, then that messenger which 
is appointed over thy punishments shall depart from 
thee. I said unto him, Sir if they have behaved them- 
selves so as to anger that good angel, yet what have I 
done ? He answered, They can not otherwise be 
afflicted, unless thou, who art the head of the family, 
suffer. For whatsoever thou shalt suffer, they must 
needs feel it : but as long as thou shalt stand well es- 
tablished, they can not experience any vexation. I 
replied, But, sir, behold they also now repent with all 



THE APOCRYPHAL EPISTLES. 453 

their hearts. I know, says he, that they repent with 
all their hearts ; but dost thou therefore think, that 
their offences who repent, are immediately blotted 
out ? No, they are not presently ; but he that repents 
must afflict his soul, and show himself humble in all 
his affairs, and undergo many and divers vexations. 
And when he shall have suffered all things that were 
appointed for him, then perhaps he that made him, and 
formed all things besides, will be moved with compas- 
sion towards him, and afford him some remedy ; and 
especially if he shall perceive his heart, who repents, 
to be pure from every evil word. But at present it is 
expedient for thee, and for thy house, to be grieved ; 
and it is needful that thou shouldest endure much vex- 
ation, as the angel of the Lord who committed thee 
unto me, has commanded. Rather give thanks unto 
the Lord, that knowing what was to come, he thought 
thee worthy to whom he should foretell that trouble 
was coming upon thee, who art able to bear it. I said 
unto him, Sir, be but thou also with me, and I shall easily 
undergo any trouble. I will, said he, be with thee ; and 
I will entreat the messenger who is set over thy pun- 
ishment, that he would moderate his afflictions towards 
thee. And moreover thou shalt suffer adversity but 
for a little time ; and then thou shalt again be restored 
to thy former state ; only continue on in the humility 
of thy mind. Obey the Lord with a pure heart, thou, 
and thy house, and thy children ; and walk in the 
commands which I have delivered unto thee ; and then 
thy repentance may be firm and pure. And if thou 
shalt keep these things with thy house, thy inconven- 
iencies shall depart from thee. And all vexation shall 



454 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

in like manner depart from all those, whosoever shall 
walk according to these commands. 

Again he showed me a willow which covered the 
fields and the mountains, under whose shadow came 
all such as were called by the name of the Lord. And 
by that willow stood an angel of the Lord very excel- 
lent and lofty ; and did cut down boughs from that 
willow with a great hook; and reached out to the 
people that were under the shadow of that willow lit- 
tle rods, as it were about a foot long. And when all 
of them had taken them, he laid aside his hook, and 
the tree continued entire, as I had before seen it. At 
which I wondered, and mused within myself. Then that 
shepherd said unto me, Forbear to wonder that that 
tree continues whole, notwithstanding so many boughs 
have been cut off from it ; but stay a little, for now it 
shall be shown thee what that angel means, who gave 
those rods to the people. So he again demanded the 
rods of them ; and in the same order that every one 
had received them, was he called to him, and restored 
his rod ; which when he had received, he examined 
them. From some he received them dry and rotten, 
and as it were touched with the moth ; those he com- 
manded to be separated from the rest, and placed by 
themselves. Others gave him their rods dry indeed, 
but not touched with the moth ; these also he ordered 
to be set by themselves. Others gave in their rods 
half dry ; these also were set apart. Others gave in 
their rods half dry and cleft ; these too were set by 
themselves. Others brought in their rods half dry and 
half green, and these were in like manner placed by 
themselves. Others delivered up their rods two parts 



THE APOCRYPHAL EPISTLES. 455 

green, and the third dry ; and they too were set apart. 
Others brought their rods two parts dry, and the third 
green ; and were also placed by themselves. Others 
delivered up their rods less dry (for there was but a 
very little, to wit, their tops dry), but they had clefts, 
and these were set in like manner by themselves. In 
the rods of others there was but a little green, and the 
rest dry; and these were set aside by themselves. 
Others came, and brought their rods green as they had 
received them, and the greatest part of the people 
brought their rods thus ; and the messenger greatly 
rejoiced at these, and they also were put apart by 
themselves Others brought their rods not only green 
but full of branches ; and these were set aside, being 
also received by the angel with great joy. Others 
brought their rods green with branches, and those also 
some fruit upon them. They who had such rods were 
very cheerful ; and the angel himself took great joy 
at them ; nor was the shepherd that stood with me 
less pleased with them. Then the angel of the Lord 
commanded crowns to be brought ; and the crowns 
were brought made of palms ; and the angel crowned 
those men in whose rods he found the young branches 
with fruit ; and commanded them to go into the tower. 
He also sent those into the tower, in whose rods he 
found branches without fruit, giving a seal unto them. 
For they had the same garment, that is, one white as 
snow ; with which he bade them go into the tower. 
And so he did to those who returned their rods green 
as they received them ; giving them ja white garment, 
and so sent them away to go into the tower. Having 
done this, he said to the shepherd that was with me, I 



456 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

go my way ; but do thou send these within the walls, 
every one into the place in which he has deserved to 
dwell; examine first their rods, but examine them 
diligently, that no one deceive thee. But and if any 
one shall escape thee, I will try them upon the altar. 
Having said this to the shepherd, he departed. After 
he was gone the shepherd said unto me, Let us take 
the rods from them all, and plant them ; if perchance 
they may grow green again. I said unto him, Sir, 
how can those dry rods ever grow green again ? He 
answered me, That tree is a willow, and always loves 
to live. If therefore these rods shall be planted, and 
receive a little moisture, many of them will recover 
themselves. Wherefore I will try, and will pour water 
upon them, and if any of them can live, I will rejoice 
with him ; but if not, at least by this means I shall be 
found not to have neglected my part. Then he com- 
manded me to call them ; and they all came unto him, 
every one in the rank in which he stood, and gave him 
their rods ; which having received, he planted every 
one of them in their several orders. And after he had 
planted them all, he poured much water upon them, 
insomuch that they were covered with water, and did 
not appear above it. Then when he had watered 
them, he said unto me, Let us depart, and after a lit- 
tle time we will return and visit them. For he who 
created this tree, would have all those live that re- 
ceived rods from it. And I hope, now that these rods 
are thus watered, many of them, receiving in the 
moisture, will recover. I said unto him, Sir, tell me 
what this tree denotes ? For I am greatly astonished, 
that after so many branches have been cut off, it seems 



THE APOCRYPHAL EPISTLES. 457 

still to be whole ; nor does there any thing the less of 
it appear to remain, which greatly amazes me. He 
answered, Hearken. This great tree which covers the 
plains and the mountains, and all the earth, is the law 
of God, published throughout the whole world. Now 
this law is the Son of God, who is preached to all the 
ends of the earth. The*people that stand under its 
shadow, are those which have heard his preaching, and 
believed. The great and venerable angel which you 
saw, was Michael, who has the power over this people, 
and governs them. For he has planted the law in the 
hearts of those who have believed : and therefore he 
visits them to whom he has given the law, to see if 
they have kept it. And he examines every one's rod ; 
and of those, many that are weakened : for those rods 
are the law of the Lord. Then he discerns all those 
who have not kept the law, knowing the place of every 
one of them. I said unto him, Sir, why did he send 
away some to the tower, and left others here to you ? 
He replied, Those who have transgressed the law which 
they received from him, are left in my power, that 
they may repent of their sins : but they who fulfilled 
the law and kept it, are under his power. But who 
then, said I, are those who went into the tower crown- 
ed? He replied, All such as have striven with the 
devil, and have overcome him, are crowned : and they are 
those who have suffered hard things, that they might 
keep the law. But they who gave up their rods green, 
and with young branches, but without fruit, have in- 
deed endured trouble for the same law, but have not 
suffered death; neither have they denied their holy 
law. They who delivered up their rods green as they 



458 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

received them, are those who were modest and just, 
and have lived with a very pure mind, and kept the 
commandments of God. The rest thou shalt know, 
when I shall have considered those rods which I have 
planted and watered. After a few days we returned, 
and in the same place stood that glorious angel, and I 
stood by him. Then he sai(£ unto me, Gird thyseli 
with a towel, and serve me. And I girded myself 
with a clean towel, which was made of coarse cloth. 
And when he saw me girded, and ready to minister 
unto him, he said, Call those men whose rods have 
been planted, every one in his order as they gave 
them. And he brought me into the field, and I called 
them all, and they all stood ready in their several 
ranks. Then he said unto them, Let every one pluck 
up his rod, and bring it unto me. And first they de- 
livered theirs, whose rods had been dry and rotten. 
And those whose rods still continued so he command- 
ed to stand apart. Then they came whose rods had 
been dry, but not rotten. Some of these delivered 
in their rods green ; others dry and rotten, as if they 
had been touched by the moth. Those who gave 
them up green, he commanded to stand apart; but 
those whose rods were dry and rotten, he caused to 
stand with the first sort. Then came they whose rods 
had been half dry, and cleft : many of these gave up 
their rods green, and uncleft. Others delivered them 
up green with branches, and fruit upon the branches, 
like unto theirs who went crowned into the tower. 
Others delivered them up dry, but not rotten : and 
some gave them as they were before, half dry, and 
cleft. Every one of these he ordered to stand apart ; 



THE APOCRYPHAL EPISTLES. 459 

some by themselves, others in their respective ranks. 
Then came they whose rods had been green, but cleft 
These delivered their rods altogether green, and stood 
in their own order. And the shepherd rejoiced at 
these, because they were all changed, and free from 
their clefts. Then they gave in their rods, who had 
them half green and half dry. Of these some were 
found wholly green, others half dry ; others green 
with young shoots. And all these were sent away, 
every one to his proper rank. Then they gave up 
their rods, who had them before two parts green, and 
the third dry. Many of these gave in their rods green ; 
many half dry ; the rest dry, but not rotten. So these 
were sent away, each to his proper place. Then came 
they who had before their rods two parts dry and the 
third green ; many of these delivered up their rods 
half dry ; others dry and rotten ; others half dry and 
cleft ; but few green. And all these were set every 
one in his own rank. Then they reached in their rods, 
in which there was before but a little green, and the 
rest dry. Their rods were for the most part found 
green, having little boughs, with fruit upon them ; 
and the rest altogether green. And the shepherd up- 
on sight of these rejoiced exceedingly, because he had 
found them thus : and they also went to their proper 
orders. Now after he had examined all their rods, he 
said unto me, I told thee that this tree loved life ; thou 
seest how many have repented, and attained unto sal- 
vation. Sir, said I, I see it. That thou mightest 
know, saith he, that the goodness and mercy of the 
Lord is great, and to be had in honor ; who gave his 
spirit to them that were found worthy of repentance. 



460 BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

I answered, Sir, why then did not all of them repent ? 
He replied, Those whose minds the Lord foresaw 
would be pure, and that they would serve him with 
all their hearts, to them he gave repentance. But for 
those whose deceit and wickedness he beheld, and per- 
ceived that they would not truly return unto him, to 
them he denied any return unto repentance, lest they 
should again blaspheme his law with wicked words. I 
said unto him, Now, sir, make known unto me, what is 
the place of every one of those who have given up 
their rods, and what their portion ; that when they 
who have not kept their seal entire, but have wasted 
the seal which they received, shall hear and believe 
these things, they may acknowledge their evil deeds 
and repent ; and receiving again their seal from you, 
may give glory to God, that he was moved with com- 
passion towards them, and sent you to renew their 
spirits. Hearken, said he ; They whose rods have been 
found dry and rotten, and as it were touched with the 
moth, are the deserters and the betrayers of the church. 
Who, with the rest of their crimes, have also blasphem- 
ed the Lord, and denied his name which had been 
called upon them. Therefore all these are dead unto 
God ; and thou seest that none of them have repented, 
although they have heard my commands which thou 
hast delivered unto them. From these men therefore 
life is far distant. They also who have delivered up 
their rods dry, but not rotten, have not been far from 
them. For they have been counterfeits, and brought 
in evil doctrines ; and have perverted the servants of 
God ; but especially those who had sinned ; not suffer- 
ing them to return unto repentance, but keeping them 



THE APOCRYPHAL EPISTLES. 4G1 

back by their false doctrines. These therefore have 
hope ; and thou seest that many of them have re- 
pented, since the time that thou hast laid my com- 
mands before them ; and many more will yet repent 
but they that shall not repent, shall lose both repent- 
ance and life. But they that have repented, their 
place has begun to be within the first walls, and some 
of them are even gone into the tower. Thou seest 
therefore, said he, that in the repentance of sinners 
there is life ; but for those that repent not, death is 
prepared. Hear now concerning those who gave in 
their rods half dry, and full of clefts. They whose 
rods were only half dry, are the doubtful ; for they 
are neither living nor dead. But they who delivered 
in their rods not only half dry, but also full of clefts, 
are both doubtful and evil speakers ; who detract from 
those that are absent, and have never peace among 
themselves, and that envy one another. Howbeit to 
these also repentance is offered ; for thou seest that 
some of these have repented. Now all those of this 
kind who have quickly repented, shall have a place in 
the tower ; but they who have been more slow in their 
repentance, shall dwell within the walls ; but they that 
shall not repent, but shall continue on in their wicked 
doings, shall die the death. As for those who had 
their rods green, but yet cleft, they are such as were 
always faithful and good, but they had some enmity 
and strife among themselves concerning dignity and 
pre-eminence. Now all such are vain and without un- 
derstanding, as contend with one another about these 
things. Nevertheless, seeing they are otherwise good, 
if when they shall hear these commands, they shall 



4C2 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

amend themselves, and shall at my persuasion suddenly 
repent ; they shall at last dwell in the tower r as they 
who have truly and worthily repented. But if any one 
shall again return to his dissension, he shall be shut 
out from the tower, and shall lose his life. For the 
life of those who keep the commandments of the 
Lord, consists in doing what they are commanded; 
not in principality, or in any other dignity. For 
by forbearance and humility of mind, men shall 
attain unto life ; but by seditions, and contempt of the 
law, they shall purchase death unto themselves. They 
who in their rods had half dry and half green, are 
those who are engaged in many affairs of the world ; 
and are not joined to the saints ; for which cause half 
of them liveth, and half is dead. Wherefore many 
of these, since the time that they have heard my com- 
mands, have repented and begun to dwell in the tower. 
But some of them have wholly fallen away ; to these 
there is no more place for repentance. For by reason 
of their present interests, they have blasphemed and 
denied God ; and for this wickedness they have lost 
life. And of these many are still in doubt ; these may 
yet return ; and if they shall quickly repent, they shall 
have a place in the tower ; but if they shall be more 
slow, they shall dwell without the walls ; but if they 
shall not repent they shall die. As for those who had 
two parts of their rods green, and the third dry ; they 
have by manifold ways denied the Lord. Of these 
many have repented, and found a place in the tower ; 
and many have altogether departed from God. These 
have utterly lost life. And some, being in a doubtful 
state, have raised up dissensions : these may yet return, 



THE APOCRYPHAL EPISTLES. 463 

if they shall suddenly repent, and not continue in their 
lusts ; but if they shall continue in their evil doing 
they shall die. They who gave in their rods two parts 
dry, and the other green, are those who have indeed 
been faithful, but withal rich and full of good things ; 
and thereupon have desired to be famous among the 
heathen which are without, and have thereby fallen 
into great pride, and begun to aim at high matters, 
and to forsake the truth : nor were they joined to the 
saints, but lived with the heathen ; and this life seemed 
the more pleasant to them. Howbeit they have not 
departed from God, but continued in the faith ; only 
they have not wrought the works of faith. Many 
therefore of these have repented ; and begun to dwell 
in the tower. Yet others still living among the 
heathen people, and being lifted up with their vanities, 
have utterly fallen away from God, and followed the 
works and wickednesses of the heathen. This kind 
of men therefore are reckoned among strangers to 
the gospel. Others of these began to be doubtful in 
their minds ; despairing, by reason of their wicked do- 
ings, ever to attain unto salvation. Others, being thus 
made doubtful, did moreover stir up dissensions. To 
these therefore, and to those who, by reason of their 
doings, are become doubtful, there is still hope of re- 
turn ; but they must repent quickly, that their place 
may be in the tower. But they that repent not, but 
continue still in their pleasures, are nigh unto death. 
As for those who gave in their rods green, excepting 
their tops, which only were dry, and had clefts, these 
were always good, and faithful, and upright before 
God : nevertheless they sinned a little, by reason of 



464 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

their empty pleasures and trifling thoughts, which 
they had within themselves. Wherefore many of 
them, when they heard my words, repented forthwith ; 
and began to dwell in the tower. Nevertheless some 
grew doubtful, and others to their doubtful minds ad- 
ded dissensions. To these therefore there is still hope 
of return, because they were always good ; but they 
shall hardly be moved. As for those, lastly, who gave 
in their rods dry, their tops only excepted, which alone 
were green ; they are such as have believed indeed in 
God, but have lived in wickedness ; yet without de- 
parting from God ; having always willingly borne the 
name of the Lord; and readily received into their 
houses the servants of God. Wherefore hearing these 
things, they returned, and without delay repented, and 
lived in all righteousness. And some of them suffered 
death; others readily underwent many trials, being 
mindful of their evil doings. And when he had ended 
his explications of all the rods, he said unto me, Go, 
and say unto all men that they repent, and they shall 
live unto God : because the Lord, being moved with 
great clemency, hath sent me to preach repentance 
unto all ; even unto those who, by reason of their evil 
doings, deserve not to attain unto salvation. But the 
Lord will be patient, and keep the invitation that was 
made by his Son. I said unto him, Sir, I hope that 
all when they shall hear these things will repent. For 
I trust that every one acknowledging his crime, and 
taking up the fear of the Lord, will return unto repent- 
ance. He said unto me, Whosoever shall repent with 
all their hearts, and cleanse themselves from all the 
evils that I have before mentioned, and not add any 



THE APOCRYPHAL EPISTLES. 465 

thing more to their sins, shall receive from the Lord 
the cure of their former iniquities, if they shall not 
make any doubt of these commands, and shall live 
unto God. But they that shall continue to add to 
their transgressions, and shall still converse with the 
lusts of this present world, shall condemn themselves 
unto death. But do thou walk in these commands, 
and thou shalt live unto God ; and whosoever shall 
walk in these, and exercise them rightly, shall live 
unto God. And having showed me all these things, 
he said, I will show thee the rest in a few days." 

The opinions of the ancients in regard to Hermas 
were not settled. Origen on Rom. xvi. 14, says, " I 
suppose that this Hennas is the author of the little 
book called the Shepherd (Pastor), a writing (scrip- 
ture) which seems to me highly useful, and it is, as I 
suppose, divinely inspired " ; and yet in his homily on 
Luke xii. 58, he expresses himself more doubtfully. 
The author of the Fragment of Muratori expresses 
himself more decidedly as to the author of the Shep- 
herd. He says, " Hermas composed the Shepherd 
very lately, in our times, in the city of Rome, while 
the bishop Pius, his brother, occupied the chair of the 
Roman church." 

Jerome (Catal. c. 10) writes, " Hermas, whom 
the apostle Paul mentions in the epistle to the Ro- 
mans (xvi. 14) they assert to be the author of 
the book which is called Pastor, and which is even 
now publicly read in some of the churches of Greece. 
It is truly a useful book, and many of the ancient wri- 
ters have taken testimonies from it, but it is almost 
unknown among the Latins ; " and yet in another pas- 
30 



466 THE LOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

sage of the same work (c. 20) he seems to reject it 
altogether. 

Tertullian, in the latter part of his life at least, de- 
cidedly rejected it; and affirms that it was classed by 
every council of the churches among the false and 
apocryphal books (De Pudic. c. 10 and 20) ; and the 
Muratorian Fragment says, u It should be read, indeed, 
but it can never be publicly read in the church, either 
among the prophets or the apostles." 

The conclusions of Eusebius are given very dis- 
tinctly, E. H. iii. 3, and are as follows. 

"But as the same apostle in the addresses at the 
close of the Epistle to the Romans, has among others 
made mention also of Hermas, of whom they say we 
have the book called Pastor, it should be observed, 
that this too is disputed by some on account of whom 
it is not placed among those of acknowledged authority 
(^o^ioloyovfievoi^. By others, however, it is judged most 
necessary, especially to those who need an elementary 
introduction. Hence we kifow that it has been already 
in public use in our churches, and I have also under- 
stood by tradition, that some of the most ancient wri- 
ters have made use of it." 

The passage in Irenaeus respecting Hermas is as fol- 
lows : 

u Well has the Scripture spoken which says, First 
of all believe that there is one God, who created all 
things and ordered all things and made all things from 
that which is not." The quotation is from Hermas, 
Command i. 1, and with reference to this passage Euse- 
bius (H. E. v. 8) says in regard to Irenaeus, "And he 
not only knew but also admitted the book called Pas- 



THE APOCRYPHAL EPISTLES. 467 

tor, in these words, ' Well is it said in that work which 
declares, First of all believe that there is one God, 
who created and arranged all things,' " etc., or transla- 
ting Eusebius with literal exactness, "Not only did he 
know, but he also receives the writing (Scripture, 
jw?) of the Shepherd, saying, Wherefore well spake 
the Scripture (writing, ygccyv) which says," etc. The 
word Scripture (jq<*<pv) was probably then used with 
rather more latitude than it is now. 

There is certainly no evidence that any of the apos- 
tles ever sanctioned the Shepherd of Hermas as of 
divine authority, or even knew of the existence of 
the book. 



CHAPTER TWELFTH. 

THE REVELATION OF ST. JOHN AND THE APOCRYPHAL REV- 
ELATIONS. 

REVELATION OF ST. JOHN, OR THE APOCALYPSE. INTRO- 
DUCTORY REMARKS. 

The official activity of John extended through a 
much longer period than that of any other of the 
primitive teachers of Christianity; for he was the 
youngest of the apostles, and reached a far more ad- 
vanced age than any of his associates. 

On account of his known character as the personal 
favorite and bosom friend of his divine Master, the 
celebrity of his writings, the extent of his travels 
ihrough Christendom, the great age to which he lived, 
his being looked upon by all the churches for a long 
period as the only man living who had seen and famil- 
liarly conversed with Jesus of Nazareth, and on account 
of the number of young men who were prepared for 
the Christian ministry under his instruction — on these 
accounts, John was more extensively known, and more 
highly venerated among the Christian churches of the 
first and second century, than any other apostle, unless 
Paul should be regarded as an exception. 

If then, the Apocalypse is falsely ascribed to John, 
we should naturally suppose that it would not have 



470 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

been ascribed to him at a very early period ; that very 
few, if any, of the writers who lived at and near his 
time, would be likely to fall into the mistake ; and that 
in a later age, the book would gradually, and in the 
face of opposition from the better informed, work its 
way into public confidence, as a genuine production 
of the beloved disciple. 

But the historical facts in the case are directly the 
reverse of all these reasonable expectations, which 
every one will see to be exactly in the natural course 
of events, on the supposition that the book is spurious. 
The testimony of the early and contemporary wit- 
nesses is unanimous and uncontradicted in favor of the 
book. Though well known and extensively used in 
the churches, not a breath of suspicion was ever blown 
upon its reputation, until nearly one hundred and 
fifty years after the death of the apostle to whom it is 
ascribed ; and then not confidently, but doubtingly, 
not on any critical grounds alleged or pretended, but 
solely on account of the supposed difficulty of its in- 
terpretation, the bad use which had been made of it, 
and a dislike to the doctrines which it was imagined 
to contain. 

THE MILLENNIAL CONTROVERSY. 

The occasion on which the genuineness of the Apoc- 
alypse was first called in question, was the following. 
About A. D. 230, Nepos, the pious and active bishop 
of Arsinoe, in Egypt, adopted the notion of the thou- 
sand years personal reign of Christ on earth, familiarly 
called the millennium, and published a book entitled, 
" Refutation of the Allegorists," in which he amplifies 



./y'v. J '/ -4-* "-^ ^«i : ,'-i i : j ii^^'iHiliriHiMH^^mii-rrUffl'i" i-ii 11 " 1 !' 1 1 .■'i !|,! p , i= , '-i:,:i i l li 




THE REVELATION OF ST. JOHN. 471 

this doctrine, advocating it with great zeal, and main- 
taining it principally by quotations from the Apoc- 
alypse. The book was very popular, and gained many 
adherents to the doctrine, and so high did their zeal 
run, that the chiliasts (as they were called) or the mil- 
lennialists, began to secede from the mother church at 
Alexandria, which opposed their notions. After the 
death of Nepos, Coracion, the pastor of a country 
church, took the lead in propagating the same senti- 
ments. Dionysius, the mild and learned bishop of 
Alexandria, desiring to put an end to this dispute, and 
unwilling to fulminate ecclesiastical thunders, which he 
knew could have no other effect than to irritate, with- 
out intimidating or subduing, went into the province 
of Arsinoe, where the seceders were most numerous, 
and proposed an amicable conference. They met him 
with their leader, Coracion, at their head, and the book 
of Nepos was carefully read, and its arguments ex- 
amined. The good bishop Dionysius, with exemplary 
patience, spent three days in reasoning with his wan- 
dering sheep, quietly listened to every thing they had 
to say, answered all their objections; and by the mild- 
ness of his bearing, and the force of his arguments, so 
completely satisfied them that they had been in the 
wrong, that Coracion, in the name of all the rest, 
thanked him for his kindness and his instructions, and 
declared that they were all convinced that he was in 
the right, and accordingly they cheerfully renounced 
their own opinions, and adopted his. A rare result of 
theological controversy ! (Neander's Church History, 
Part i. p. 1094 ff. in German.) 



472 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE 



THE APOCALYPSE THEN FIRST QUESTIONED. 

This took place A. D. 255, and Dionysius, to secure 
the victory which he had gained, wrote a work on the 
Promises. Notwithstanding his wonderful success, the 
affair had given Dionysius a great deal of trouble, the 
whole of which he was disposed to attribute to the in- 
fluence of the Apocalypse, and began to doubt wheth- 
er a book which he supposed had done so much mis- 
chief, could be of divine authority, or at any rate the 
production of an apostle. Accordingly, in his work 
on the Promises, he expresses himself to the following 
effect, namely, "that some before his time had reject- 
ed the book, alleging that it was altogether dark, en- 
tirely without sense and reason, and ascribed it to the 
heretic Cerinthus ; that he, however, would not, him- 
self, presume to reject it, as many of his christian 
brethren held it in high estimation. He acknowledged 
that he could not understand the book, yet would not, 
on that account, reject it, but would allow that it was 
written by a man named John, who was a holy and in- 
spired man." u But I would not, (says he) easily agree 
that this was the apostle, the son of Zebedee, and 
brother of James, who is the author of the gospel and 
general epistles which bear his name. But I conjec- 
ture from the general tenor of both, and the form and 
complexion of the composition, and the execution of 
the whole book, that it is not from him." " That it is 
a John that wrote these things, we must believe him, 
as he says it; but what John it is, is uncertain." U I 
am of opinion, that there were many of the same name 
with John the apostle, who, for their love and admira- 



THE REVELATION OF ST. JOHN. 473 

tion of him, adopted the same epithet." "They say 
that there are two monuments at Ephesus, and that 
each bears the name of John ; and from the sentiments 
and expressions (of the two works in question, the 
Gospel and Apocalypse) as also from their composition, 
it micht be very reasonably conjectured that this one 
is different from that" — and thus he continues through 
several paragraphs — saying nothing directly — denying 
nothing positively, but exhibiting great doubt and 
perplexity. (Eusebius, Eccl. Hist. Book vii. 25). 

This was the first open attack ever made on the 
genuineness of the Apocalypse ; and it is plain from 
the above extracts, that Dionysius could sustain him- 
self by no respectable authority, otherwise he would 
have produced it; and the "some before himself" to 
whom he alludes so generally, were probably those 
who had been engaged in the same controversy with 
Nepos, and whose minds had received a bias similar to 
his own. It is also plain, that he had no historical 
ground for his conjectures and suggestions, but that 
the testimony was all against him ; that he was not him- 
self at all confident in his own opinion ; and that his 
wish to get rid of the authority of this book, arose 
entirely from his apprehension of its obscurity, and its 
influence on the millennial controversy. This contro- 
versy continued to prevail through several centuries, 
particularly in Asia ; and wherever it prevailed, the 
anti-millennialists felt the same anxiety to rid them- 
selves of the authority of the Apocalypse. This kept 
up the controversy in regard to the book ; and all who 
have rejected the book, have been induced to reject 
it, not on historical testimony against it, or the want 



474 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

of such testimony in its favor, but simply on doctrinal 
grounds. 

TESTIMONIES TO THE REVELATION OF JOHN. 

We introduce these testimonies by a striking pas- 
sage from Irenaeus. Irenaeus here seems to say that 
the Revelation was seen in the reign of Domitian ; but 
this is by no means certain, as the reader will see by 
turning back to the remarks on page 187 of this vol- 
ume. 

The ancients were by no means agreed as to the 
time when John saw the Apocalypse. It was fixed to 
the reign of Nero, certainly by Theophylact, Hippol- 
ytus, Arethas, and the Syrian translator, and probably 
also by Clement of Alexandria and Tertullian. Epi- 
phanius puts it in the reign of Claudius the predeces- 
sor of Nero ; while Eusebius, Jerome and Victorinus 
decide for Domitian. Nero Claudius Domitius or Dom- 
itianus was the full name of the persecuting emperor ; 
and hence we see how it happened that by different 
ancient writers both Claudius and Domitian were put 
in the place -of Nero. Some of the ablest modern 
commentators, as Stuart, Guericke and others, decide 
for the time of Nero. Compare, however, Alford's 
Greek Testament, Yol. iv. p. 230-36. 

Eusebius (E. H. v. 8. ) gives the passage of Irenaeus, 
(Haer. v. 30) and as here we happily have the work 
of Irenaeus himself still extant, we know that the 
quotation by Eusebius is faithful and correct, and we 
have no reason for a contrary supposition in regard to 
any of the passages from ancient authors, quoted by 
Eusebius. 



THE REVELATION OF ST. JOHN. 475 

"Since we have promised in the outset of our work 
to give extracts occasionally when we refer to the dec- 
larations of the ancient presbyters and historians of 
the church, in which they have transmitted the tradi- 
tions that have descended to us respecting the sacred 
Scriptures, among these Irenaeus was one. This is 
what this author says in the third book of the work 
already mentioned ; and in the fifth, he thus descants 
on the Revelation" of John and the calculation of anti- 
christ's name : u As matters are thus, and the number 
is thus found in all the genuine and ancient copies, 
and as they who saw John attest, reason itself shows 
that the number of the name of the beast is indicated 
by the Greek letters which it contains." And a little 
further on he speaks of the same John: "We, there- 
fore," says he, "do not venture to affirm any thing 
with certainty respecting the name of antichrist. For 
were it necessary that his name should be clearly an- 
nounced to the present age, it would have been de- 
clared by him who saw the revelation. For it has not 
been long since it was seen, but almost in our own 
generation, about the end of Domitian's reign." ( T ^ 
Jofisnavov agxrjs. ) These are what he states respecting 
the Revelation. Irenaeus had been well acquainted 
with these men who had" seen John, for they were his 
own teachers. No contrary contemporary testimo: 
can be adduced. Could the Apocalypse have been so 
soon forged, so soon ascribed to John, so soon have 
gained general credence, while John was yet living, 
and among his personal friends ? How could Polycarp 
and Papias have consulted John as to the reading of a 
passage in a work which he never wrote, and which 



476 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

was falsely ascribed to him, without detecting its spu- 
riousness ? 

Hermas. The Shepherd of Hermas was probably 
written very soon after the Revelation of John, and 
being a work of the same kind, contains frequent allu- 
sions to it. The most obvious difference between the 
two books, which must at once strike the mind of 
every careful reader is, that John, of the Revelation, 
is a good Christian of the apostolic age, writing under 
the immediate influence of divine inspiration, while 
Hermas, of the Shepherd, is a good Christian of the 
same age, or of the age immediately following, writing 
without any such special divine influence. Compare 
Hermas' Vision iii , with Rev. xxi. 14, iii. 12. 

Papias and others. " Concerning the divine inspi- 
ration of the Apocalypse it is not necessary to multi- 
ply words, blessed men testifying that it is worthy of 
belief. Gregory the Theologian, Cyrill, and still ear- 
lier Papias, Irenaeus, Hippolytus and Methodius." 
Andreas, Proleg, in Apoc. p. 175. 

Justin Martyr. "And a certain man of us whose 
name was John, one of the twelve apostles of Christ, 
in that revelation of Christ which was exhibited to 
him, foretold that the faithful would live a thousand 
years in Jerusalem, and after that a universal resurrec- 
tion of all men and the final judgment." Rev. xx. 

"John wrote the Apocalypse which Justin Martyr 
and Irenaeus interpreted." Jerome, de Yir. ill. c. 9. 

"He, (Justin Martyr, ) writes also, that even down to 
his time, gifts of prophecy shone forth in the church ; 
mentions also, the Revelation of John, plainly calling 



THE REVELATION OF ST. JOHN. 477 

it the work of the apostle, and records also certain 
prophetic declarations, in his discussion with Tryphon." 
Euseb. E. H. iv. 18. 

Melito. "He wrote two books concerning the pass- 
over and concerning the Revelation of John." 

Euseb. E. H. iv. 26. 

" Melito wrote concerning the Devil one book, and 
concerning the Revelation of John." Jerome de Yir. 
ill. c. 29. 

Apollonius. u He quotes, also, the Revelation of 
John as testimony ; and relates, also, that a dead man 
was raised by the divine power, through the same 
John, at Ephesus." Euseb. E. H. v. 18. 

Churches of Vienne and Lyons. u For he was also 
a real disciple of Christ, and followed the Lamb whith- 
ersoever he went." Rev. xiv. 4. " Not abashed when 
overcome by the martyrs, but evidently destitute of 
all reason, the madness both of the governor and the 
people, as of some savage beast, blazed forth so much 
the more, to exhibit the same unjust hostility against 
us. That the Scriptures might be fulfilled, 'He that 
is unjust let him be unjust still, and he that is right- 
eous let him be righteous still.'" Rev. xxii. 11. 
u But if any one of us, either by letter or in conversa- 
tion, called them martyrs, they seriously reproved us. 
For they cheerfully yielded the title of martyr to 
Christ, the true and faithful martyr, (witness) the first 
begotten from the dead, the prince of divine life." 
Rev. i. 5, iii. 14. 

Irenaeus. "But also John the disciple of the Lord, 
seeing in the Apocalypse the sacerdotal and glorious 
coming of the kingdom." Haer. iv. 20, Rev. i. 12-16. 



478 BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

"And jet moro manifestly concerning the last time, 
and concerning the ten kings there, among whom the 
empire which now reigns will be divided. John the 
disciple of the Lord signified in the Apocalypse, dis- 
tinguishing what the ten horns would be which were 
seen by Daniel, saying thus it was told to me." Haer. 
v. 26. Compare also Eusebius, E. H. v. 3. 

Atlienagoras. "And the earth shall give up the 
dead which she hath received." Legat. p. 39, Rev. 
xx. 13. 

Theophilus. "And there is extant another book of 
Theophilus against the heresy of Hermogenes, in 
which he uses the testimonies taken from the Revela- 
tion of John." Euseb. E. H. iv. 24. 

"This Eye was the head and beginning of sin, as 
she was seduced by a serpent, through whom the ma- 
lignant Devil spoke, who is called the Devil and Satan, 
and to this day operates in those who act in his spirit, 
and he does not cease to be called the Devil. He is 
also called Daemon and Dragon." Ad Autol. ii. Rev. 
xii. 3-9. 

Clement of Alexandria. "And though he may not 
be honored with the first seat on earth, he will be en- 
throned on the four and twenty thrones judging the 
people, as John says in the Apocalypse." Strom, vi. p. 
667; Rev. iv. 4, 11, 16. 

"And we understand that the Jerusalem from above 
will be constructed of several stones ; and we admit 
that twelve gates of the heavenly city, assimilated to 
precious stones, signify the distinguished grace of the 
apostolic voice." Ibid. ii. p. 207, Rev. xxi. 21. 

Tertullian. "John in the Apocalypse commands 



THE REVELATION OF ST. JOHN. 479 

that those who eat things offered to idols and commit 
fornication should be cast out." De Praesc. c. 33, Rev. 
ii. 20. 

"For also the apostle John in the Apocalypse de- 
scribes a sword coming out of the mouth of God, two- 
edged, very sharp, which should be understood of tho 
Divine Word, two-edged with the two Testaments of 
the Law and the Gospel." Adv. Marc. iii. 14. 

"We also have the churches brought up by John ; 
for although Marcion rejects his Apocalypse, yet the 
order of bishops traced to the origin will stand to 
John as the author." Ibid. iv. 5. 

Caius. Eusebius, E. H. iii. 28. About the same 
time, we have understood, appeared Cerinthus, the 
leader of another heresy. Caius, whose words we 
quoted above, in "The Disputation" attributed to him, 
writes thus respecting him: "But Cerinthus, by 
means of revelations which he pretended were written 
by a great apostle, also falsely pretended to wonder- 
ful things, as if they were showed him by angels, as- 
serting, that after the resurrection there would be an 
earthly kingdom of Christ, and that the flesh, i. e. men, 
again inhabiting Jerusalem, would be subject to de- 
sires and pleasures. Being also an enemy to the divine 
Scriptures, with a view to deceive men, he said that 
there would be a space of a thousand years for cele- 
brating nuptial festivals." Dionysius also, who ob- 
tained the episcopate of Alexandria in our day, in the 
second book " On Promises," where he says some things 
as if received by ancient tradition, makes mention of 
the same man, in these words: "But it is highly 
probable that Cerinthus, the same that established the 



480 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE . 

heresy that bears his name, designedly affixed the name 
(of John) to his own forgery. For one of the doc- 
trines that he taught was, that Christ would have an 
earthly kingdom. And as he was a voluptuary, and 
altogether sensual, he conjectured that it would con- 
sist in those things that he craved in the gratification 
of appetite and lust ; i. e. in eating,, drinking, and mar- 
rying, or in such things whereby he supposed these 
sensual pleasures might be presented in more decent 
expressions; viz. in festivals, sacrifices, and the slay- 
ing of victims." John the apostle once entered a bath 
to wash; but ascertaining Cerinthus was within, he 
leaped out of the place, and fled from the door, not 
enduring to enter under the same roof with him, and 
exhorted those with him to do the same, saying, "let 
ur flee, lest the bath fall in, as long as Cerinthus, that 
enemy of the truth, is within." 

The above from Eusebius respecting Caius of Rome 
and Dionysius, I have inserted to indicate the reason 
why the authority of the Apocalypse was ever ques- 
tioned in the ancient church, not because there was 
any evidence against it, or any lack of evidence in its 
favor, but simply because certain mischievous heretics 
had made a bad use of it. 

Origen. "And John the son of Zebedee says in 
the Apocalypse, And I saw an angel flying through 
the midst of heaven having the everlasting gospel to 
preach to them that dwell on the earth." Comment. 
in Joan. i. Rev. xiv. 6, 7. 

John himself bears witness in the Apocalypse in 
these words : "I John, who also am your brother, and 



THE REVELATION CF ST. JOHN. 481 

companion in tribulation, and in the kingdom and pa- 
tience of Jesus Christ, was in the isle that is called 
Patmos, for the word of God, and for the testimony 
of Jesus Christ ; and it appears that he saw the Apoc- 
alypse in the island." Comment, in Matth. xvi. Rev. 
i. 9. And therefore John rightly an apostle and evan- 
gelist, and now on account of the Apocalypse a pro- 
phet, described the Word of God in the Apocalypse. 
Comment, in Joan. 

Hippolytus. "And also concerning the gospel and 
Apocalypse according to John." Canon pasch. 

" Saint Hippolytus, the martyr bishop, composed a 
book concerning dispensation — — and also an apology 
for the Apocalypse and Gospel of John the apostle 
and evangelist." Ebed Jesu. Catal. v. 6. Syr. Lardner 
iii. 99. 

"Hippolytus wrote some commentaries on the Scrip- 
tures, of which I have found these, in Hexaemeron 
de Apocalypse, etc." Jerome de Vir. ill. c. 61. 

"For he, being in the island of Patmos, sees the 
Apocalypse, in which awful mysteries are unfolded, 
and explaining them he teaches others. Tell me now 
I pray thee, blessed John, apostle and disciple of 
the Lord, what thou didst hear and see concerning 

Babylon and one of the seven angels came who 

had the seven phials," etc, De Christo et Anti- 
christo, 36. 

Dionysius of Alexandria. Eusebius (E. H. vii. 24, 
25) makes a very prolix statement of the opinions of 
Dionysius respecting the Apocalypse, but it is too long 
to be inserted here. 

By the following statement of Eusebius respecting 
31 



482 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Dionysius, it is evident that he did at first receive the 
Apocalypse as a genuine work of the apostle John, 
like all the other pastors till his time. (E. H. vii. 10). 

"Gallus had not held the government quite two 
years when he was removed, and Valerian, with his 
son Gallienus, succeeded in his place. What Dionysius 
has also said respecting him, may be learned from his 
epistle to Her mammon, in which he gives the follow- 
ing account : ' In like manner it was revealed to John, 
and there was,' says he, 'a mouth given him, speaking 
great things, and blasphemy. And there was given 
him power, and forty-two months, but it is wonderful 
that both took place in Valerian, and especially when 
we consider the condition of the man before this, how 
kind and friendly he was towards the pious." (Rev. 
xiii. 5). 

Cyprian. De Bon. Pat. u God the Father com- 
manded that his Son should be worshipped , but in 
the Revelation an angel rebuked John wishing to wor- 
ship him, and said, See thou do it not, for I am thy 
fellow servant and of thy brethren ; worship Jesus the 
Lord." Rev. xix. 10. 

De Eleemos. u Hear the voice of the Lord in the 
Revelation, reproving men of this sort with just re- 
bukes." Rev. iii. 17, 18. 

Epist. 63. "For the Sacred Scripture in the Apoc- 
alypse declares that waters signifies peoples" Rev. 
xvii. 15. 

Methodius. Conviv. p. 70. " But John in the Apoc- 
alypse, being inspired by Christ, teaches us that the 
word, which was made flesh, is also chief Virgin, and 
chief Pastor, and chief Prophet." (He here quotes, 
Rev. xiv. 1-4). 



THE REVELATION OF ST. JOHN. 483 

Victor inus of Pettau, De Fabric. Mund. "And 
therefore without doubt there are twelve angels of the 
day and twelve angels of the night, according to the 
number of the hours. There are the twenty-four wit- 
nesses of the days and the nights, who are seated be- 
fore the throne of God having golden crowns on their 
heads, whom in the Apocalypse of John the apostle 
and evangelist, he calls elders, because indeed they are 
elders both to the other angels and to men." Rev. 
iv. 4. 

" The open book is the Apocalypse which John 
saw." Lardner iv. p. 216. 

" John was in the island of Patmos — — There he 

saw the Apocalypse -So afterwards he delivered 

this same Apocalypse which he had accepted from the 
Lord — that is, Thou must again prophecy," etc. Rev. 
x. xi. Kirchhofer, p. 322. 

Yictorinus, bishop of Pettau, was not so well skilled 
in Latin as in Greek. Whence his works are great in 
meaning, but low in the construction of words. They 
are these, Commentaries on Genesis — on the Apoc- 
alypse of John — and many others." Jerome, Catal. 
Vir. ill. c. 74. 

"Of which book (the Apocalypse) Yictorinus, call- 
ed bishop, discussed certain most difficult passages." 
Cassiodor. Ju. Div. c. 5. 

Pamphihis. Apol. pro. Orig. "John says in his 
Revelation, The sea gave up the dead which were in 
it, and death and hell gave up the dead which were 
in them." Rev. xx. 13. 

Lactantius. Epist. p. 42. "His name is known to 
none except to himself and His Father, as John teach- 
es in the Revelation." (xix. 12). 



484 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Instit. vii. 10. "But he who contaminates himself 
with vices and crimes and is a slave to voluptuousness, 
he, being damned suffers eternal punishment, which 
the Divine Scriptures called the second death ; which 
is also perpetual and full of the most grievous torments." 
Rev. ii. 11, xxi. 8. 

Eusebius. Demonst. Evan. viii. p. 386. "Whence 
he says, the Lion of the tribe of Judah hath prevailed, 
and he himself hath opened the seals attached to the 
book, as we read in the Apocalypse of John." Rev. 
v. 5. 

"In this persecution it is handed down by tradition 
that the apostle and evangelist John, who was yet 
living, in consequence of his testimony to the divine 
word, was condemned to dwell in the island of Patmos. 
Irenaeus indeed, in his fifth book against the heretics, 
where he speaks of the calculations formed on the 
epithet of Antichrist, in the above mentioned Reve- 
lation of John, speaks in the following manner respect- 
ing him." E. H. iii. 18, Rev. xiii. 18. 

"About this time also, for a very short time, arose 
the heresy of those called Nicolaitans, of which men- 
tion is made in the Revelation of John." E. H. iii. 19, 
Rev. ii. 6, etc. 

Athanasius. " The Holy Scripture pronounces that 
the Son eternally co-exists with the Father when it 
says, In the beginning was the Word and the Word 
was with God and the Word was God. And in the 
Apocalypse, These things saith He who is and who 
was and who is to come." Cont. Av. ii. Rev. i. 8. 

Ejpiphanius, in his great work on the Haeresies very 
often quotes the Revelation ; and always as Scripture 



THE REVELATIONS OF ST. JOHN 485 

and as the genuine work of John, the apostle and 
evangelist. 

Hilary. In Psalm i. Lardner v. p. 252. u But that 
these leaves of the tree are not useless, but salutary 
to the nations, St. John testifies in the Apocalypse." 
Rev. xxii. 2. 

De Trinit. vi. Matthew from a publican was chosen 
to be an apostle ; and John on account of his famil- 
iarity with the Lord was worthy of the Revelation of 
the heavenly mysteries. 

Jerome. In Psalm 149. u We read in the Apoc- 
alypse of John, which is read and received in the 
churches; for it is not held among the apocryphal 
Scriptures, but among the Scriptures of the church." 

Adv. Jovin. ii. 14. " The apostle who wrote the 

book of the Gospel is a prophet, for he saw in 

the island of Patmos the Apocalypse, containing 

infinite mysteries of the future." 

In Isaiam. Proe. Kirchhofer, p. 328. "In which 
way also, that is spiritually, the Apocalypse of John is 
to be understood.' 

Augustin. Passim. "John the apostle in the Apoc- 
alypse." "The same John the evangelist in that book 
which is called the Apocalypse." " In the Apocalypse 
of John himself, whose is this Gospel," etc., etc. 

OBJECTIONS TO THE APOCALYPSE. 

Let us now turn our attention to the objections to 
its authenticity, which some regard of sufficient weight 
to counterbalance the whole force of this concurrent 
and uncontradicted testimony of the ancients. 

1. It was conjectured by Dionysius, as you have 



486 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

already seen, that the Apocalypse was written, not by 
John the apostle, but by a certain presbyter named 
John, who lived at Ephesus about the same time. 

To this, we reply, 1st. It is directly contrary to all 
contemporary and early testimony. The writers of the 
first age knew of no such presbyter John, but ascribe 
the Apocalypse to John the apostle. 2d. The very 
existence of any such John the presbyter, as a differ- 
ent person from John the apostle, is very problemati- 
cal. He makes no figure in ecclesiastical history, and 
we are strongly tempted to believe, that his existence 
is a mere conjecture of those who wished to get rid 
of the apostolic authority of the Apocalypse. 

The apostle John styles himself the elder or presby- 
ter in the first verse of his second and third epistles, 
and this might first have given rise to the story of two 
Johns at Ephesus. Eusebius infers and stoutly argues 
in favor of a presbyter John, distinct from the apostle^ 
from the fact that the name of John twice occurs in 
the following passage of Papias, in which he says that 
he made it a point to inquire u what was said by 
Thomas, James, John, Matthew, or any other of the 
disciples of our Lord. What was said by Aristion, 
and the presbyter John, disciple of our Lord " (Euseb. 
iii. 39). Whether the presbyter John here mentioned, 
be the same with John the apostle, or John whose sur- 
name was Mark (Acts xii. 25), or some other John, 
it certainly can not prove, in direct opposition to all 
testimony, that John the apostle did not write the 
Apocalypse. 

2. Another objection of Dionysius, and one which has 
been often repeated since, is, that John's name is affix- 



THE REVELATION OF ST. JOHN. 487 

ed to the Apocalypse, which is not the case with his 
Gospel or first epistle. This is a very singular argu- 
ment ; as much as to say, if a man publishes one work 
anonymously, and another with his name to it, we are 
to reject the one which bears his name, because the 
other is anonymous. 

Again : though the apostle John does not describe 
himself by name, to be the writer of the Gospel, yet 
he does declare himself to be the author in terms so 
express, that he well knew any one would understand 
them (John xxi. 24 compared with verse 20, and xiii. 
23-25, and xix. 35). 

The nature of the Apocalypse, it being prophecy in 
the most sublime style of inspiration, required a more 
distinct enunciation of its author to give it authority, 
than the plain narrative of the Gospel. This is accord- 
ing to the analogy of other prophecies. Not a book of 
prophecy occurs in the Old Testament, which is not 
accompanied by the name of the writer. John while 
prophesying, of course, adopted the prophetic mode 
of writing. 

3. The style and language of the Apocalypse is very 
different from that of the Gospel and Epistles. This is 
true, and the style ought to be different ; for the whole 
subject and the whole mode of treating it is entirely 
dxfferent. Style varies with the varieties of the sub- 
ject. Is the genuineness of Milton's Paradise Lost to 
be disputed, because it is not written in the same style 
with his Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce ? Or New- 
ton's work on Chronology and the Bible, because they 
are not in the style of his Principia ? There is, how- 
ever, a striking resemblance in some particulars, be- 



488 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

tween the style of the Apocalypse and that of the 
Gospel. There is the same depth and peculiarity of 
feeling in both. 

4. It is objected that the Greek of the Apocalypse 
is much less pure and more largely tinctured with He- 
brew idioms than that of the Gospel or Epistles. This 
is true, and for the best of reasons. The Apocalypse 
was written earlier than the Gospel or Epistles, and be- 
fore the writer had become so familiar with the Greek 
language as he was afterwards. Again, almost every 
sentence in the Apocalypse is written with particular 
reference to some passage of the Old Testament proph- 
ecies, and of course it takes a Hebrew coloring. We 
are led to think that the apostle had no book with him 
in his exile and solitude but his Hebrew Bible ; that 
this was his constant meditation, and the whole train 
of his thoughts was shaped and modified by its lan- 
guage and imagery. 

5. It is said that the Apocalypse is not included in 
the most ancient Syrian translation. It is true, that 
some of the manuscripts of the Syrian translation 
which have been brought to Europe, do not contain 
this book. But that the book was well known and ac- 
knowledged as genuine in the Syrian churches, is evi- 
dent from the fact, that in the second century it was 
quoted as Scripture by Theophilus, bishop of Antioch. 
In the early part of the third century its genuineness 
was vindicated against the attack of Caius by Hippo- 
lytus, who was held in high repute by the Syrians ; and 
in the fourth century it is quoted as the work of John, 
by the Syrian saint, Ephraem. (Works of Ephr. t. ii. 
p. 332 ; iii. 616: and in Greek, ii. 252 ; iii. 52.) 



THE REVELATION OF ST. JOHN. 489 

The Syrian manuscripts which do not contain the 
books, were probably written after the millennial con- 
troversy had made the Revelation distasteful to a pow- 
erful party in the church. 

6. But the great, and in fact, the only objection 
against the Revelation, which has had any real impor- 
tance, has always been that which was at first stated 
by Dionysius, namely that it was very obscure, without 
sense and reason, as Dionysius says, exceedingly difficult 
to be interpreted ; and the great storehouse from which 
heretics and fanatics have drawn their materials to 
trouble the church with. The want of 'sense and 
reason' belongs to the interpreters, and not to the 
book. Obscurity, to a certain extent, is an attribute 
of all prophecy, and heretics and fanatics always lay 
hold on the most highly figurative language, because 
this is the most easily perverted. Even allowing the 
objection to be just as it is stated, it has but little to 
do with the question of authorship, which is a question 
of fact, to be settled by the appropriate evidence ; and 
no one has ever shown, or done anything towards 
showing, that there is anything in the Revelation so 
repugnant to the known character of John, that he can 
not reasonably be supposed to be the author of it. A 
writer is not accountable for the stupidity of his com- 
mentators, nor for the ignorance or wilful abuse, 
which weak men and bad men may make of his wri- 
tings. I hope it will be seen that the darkness, the 
absurdities, the mysticism, and fanaticism, which have 
been attributed to the Apocalypse, no more belong to 
it, than dinginess belongs to the clear blue sky, when 
it happens to be observed through a dingy glass. 



490 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

I have been thus particular in stating the whole ar- 
gument, in respect to the genuineness of the Revela- 
tion, on account of the peculiar attitude in which it 
stands before the Christian world, and because of the 
many and various opinions respecting it. 

I would here say to my readers, take the book of 
Revelation, and read it once through without reference 
to anything which you have ever heard said about it, 
and without attempting to apply its predictions to any 
of the events of history, with which you are familiar. 
Read it simply for the sake of enjoying it ; read it as 
a glowing description of a series of magnificent pic- 
tures which were passing before the eye of the writer ; 
read it for the sake of throwing your soul into its sub- 
lime acts of adoration of the Great Supreme ; read it 
for the sake of becoming imbued with its spirit, with- 
out troubling yourselves as to the historical applica- 
tion of its symbols ; and remember, while you read, 
that it is an Oriental, an Asiatic, and a Hebrew book. 
(On the subject of this chapter, compare particularly 
the introductions of Michaelis, Hug, and Home, among 
the older writers ; and Stuart, Guericke, Duesterdieck, 
Alford, and Wordsworth of the more recent ones.) 

GENERAL DESIGN OF THE BOOK. 

When we enter on the investigation of a much dis- 
puted subject, it is very desirable to find some common 
ground on which all agree and from which we may take 
our departure. Such a common ground we have, even 
in reference to the interpretation of the Apocalypse. 

Almost all interpreters agree substantially in this : 
namely, that it is the general object of this book to ex- 



THE REVELATION OF ST. JOHN. 491 

cite and encourage Christians in times of depression 
and persecution, by disclosing to them the glories and 
the terrors of the invisible world ; to show the dread- 
fulness of the punishments which await the enemies 
of religion, and the nearness and delight of the rewards 
which await its friends ; and to assure those who are 
exposing themselves to suffering in the cause of Christ, 
of the ultimate and complete triumph of this cause 
over every form of hostility, however malignant and 
powerful. This was its original and acknowledged 
purpose, and this purpose it has abundantly answered 
in every age of the church, notwithstanding the nu- 
merous abuses to which it has been subjected. And 
this is an instance of the care which God takes to se- 
cure the original end, for which his institutions are 
designed. Notwithstanding all the abuses of this book, 
the church in times of distress has always used it, as 
it was designed to be used, for comfort and encour- 
agement. 

Diversity of opinion has arisen in making the appli- 
cation of its symbolic language, to particular events 
of subsequent history ; and the diversity has been as 
endless as the varieties of fancy and passion among 
men ; and the difficulty and obscurity which envelope 
the book, arise from its being read with the idea that 
each of its symbols must be appropriated to some one 
corresponding event of history ; and that the book is 
valuable only as a collection of predictions, which have 
had or are to have, punctual and literal accomplish- 
ment. 

That the book contains much of prophecy, there can 
be no doubt ; but I apprehend that the idea of proph- 



492 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

ecy as applied to the Revelation is generally too literal 
and narrow ; that the constant and anxious search for 
the fulfillment of predictions has often prevented 
readers from seeing that the book contains much, of 
the highest value to the Christian, which is not proph- 
ecy. 

It is desirable often to read the book, and leave the 
prophetic application of its symbols entirely out of 
view, and look at the passages just as they stand — liv- 
ing pictures of eternal realities, which are invisible to 
mortal eyes — and endeavor, at the same time, to unfold 
their more striking peculiarities, and to trace their con- 
nection with the prophetic poetry of the Old Testa- 
ment. 

INTERPRETATION OF THE APOCALYPSE. 

The Laws of Interpretation, as we say in the Preface, 
are given in the volume on the Old Testament. A few 
brief hints on the subject of Symbolic Prophecy is all 
that can find place here. 

A symbol is the same as a signal. From its own na- 
ture it can express only a general idea, never a spe- 
cific one. You see a ship at sea with the flag at half 
mast. This gives you the general idea that there is 
distress on board, but what the distress is, the signal 
(or symbol) does not inform you. It may be sickness, 
mutiny, want of provisions or water, a leak, or any num- 
ber of different kinds of misfortune, you have no idea 
which ; the single idea which you get is that the people 
are in distress and want help. The symbol is equally ap- 
propriate to express any of the different sources of ca- 
lamity, and no more appropriate to express one than the 



THE REVELATION OF ST. JOHN. 493 

other. Just so in prophecy. The mere appropriate- 
ness of a symbol is no proof of its application to a 
specific event in prophecy, though inappropriateness 
is a decisive argument against its application. 

The same symbols that appropriately represent the 
calamitous expedition of Xerxes into Greece, would 
also appropriately represent the calamitous expedition 
of Napoleon into Russia ; the same symbols that would 
appropriately represent the distress of the French 
during their revolution, would also be appropriate 
to the Jewish-Roman war. To ^ the specific applica- 
tion of symbols, you must always have, besides the 
appropriateness of the symbols themselves, some local- 
izing fact or circumstance which confines the symbols 
to one historical series of appropriate events rather 
than another. Otherwise all disputes about the appli- 
cation of prophetic symbols, is like standing on shore 
and disputing about the particular calamity on board 
a ship at sea with the flag at half mast ; one affirming 
it is cholera, another that it is small pox, another that 
it is mutiny, another that it is want of water, and none 
of them knowing in the least whereof they affirm. 

They must hear directly from the ship itself before 
they can decide as to the particular kind of distress 
which she is suffering. 

It is the neglect of this idea which is the cause of 
the interminable disputes about the historical applica- 
tion of prophetic symbols. Mere appropriateness is 
taken as sufficient ground for the historical application ; 
but there are very many different historical events to 
which the symbols are all and equally appropriate. 
The particular localizing fact or circumstance must 
always be first ascertained. 



494 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Moreover a series of Symbolic Prophecies is like a 
gallery of historical pictures ; the pictures are hung 
along upon the wall of the room in the order in which 
the events occurred. There is succession without 
chronology, order without dates, proximity in place 
without proximity in time. The superintendent of 
the gallery hangs the pictures along close together, and 
does not leave spaces between the frames proportionate 
to the intervals of time that intervened between the 
transactions represented in the several pictures. 

Now just so is prophecy constructed. Just such a 
picture gallery are the symbolic prophecies of the Bible; 
succession without chronology, order without dates, 
proximity in place without proximity in time. A few 
pictures have the dates upon them, but a very few, 
and much fewer than is usually imagined. 

The Numbers in the symbolic prophecies are 
themselves symbolic, and not literal. Thus in the 
Apocalypse, 3^ 7, 10, 42, 1260, are all symbolic, and 
not to be literally understood. This is fully proved 
and copiously illustrated in the chapter on the Laws 
of Interpretation already referred to. 

We are now prepared to give an opinion as to the 

SPECIAL APPLICATION OF THE PROPHETIC SYMBOLS OF THE 
APOCALYPSE. 

This whole book, with its names and imagery, is man- 
ifestly symbolical ■ Thus in ii. 6, 14, 20, Nicolaitans or 
Balaamites, designate selfish and money-loving ecclesi- 
astics ; Jezebel, a noisy, licentious woman, &c. 

In the book two cities are represented as being de- 
stroyed, and a third is established on their ruins. 



THE REVELATION OF ST. JOHN 495 

The first, Sodom, is clearly pointed out to be Jeru- 
salem, xi. 1, 2, 8, by the mention of the temple and 
the holy city — 'where also our Lord was crucified.' 
The seven trumpets, therefore, and chapters viii.-xi. 
clearly refer to Jerusalem, or Jewish institutions. 
This we are sure of on critical grounds. 

The second city, Babylon, is clearly pointed out to 
be Rome (xiii. 18 ; xvii. 9, 18). Six hundred and 
sixty-six (666) is the sum of the numerals in the Greek 
word, AccTeivog (lateinos) meaning Roman ; and the city 
on seven hills, which then ruled over the kings of the 
earth, could be no other than Rome. The seven vials 
therefore, and chapters xiii.-xviii. plainly refer to 
Rome, or Roman institutions. This, also, we are sure 
of on critical grounds. But Rome appears in two 
forms, first as a marine monster (xiii.), then as a woman 
sitting on a scarlet colored beast (xvii.) ; so that there 
must be two Romes, the Pagan and the Papal. The 
third city, established on the ruins of the two former, 
is the New Jerusalem, which descends from God out of 
heaven (xxi. 2). From this fact, we are also sure on 
critical grounds, that this third city must be symbolical, 
and not literal ; and we are led to infer that the other 
two also are symbolical and not literal. 

The circumstances in which the author wrote, the 
purpose for which he wrote, and the whole structure 
of the work, show, that the three cities are symbolical 
of the three religions then contending for supremacy ; 
the first two of which were united against the last, 
that is Paganism and Judaism were united against 
Christianity. 

The general subject of the prophecy, then, is the 



496 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

destruction of the two great antagonist powers of 
Christianity, persecuting Judaism and persecuting 
Paganism, and the triumph, and finally complete es- 
tablishment of the religion of Christ over the whole 
world. 

In accordance with the genius of prophecy, a full 
picture is given of the then present condition of things, 
and the most prominent and characteristic points of 
the future, are hastily, but clearly sketched. 

ANALYSIS OF THE APOCALYPSE. 

Two dates assigned to it, — one in the reign of Nero, 
the other in the reign of Domitian. External testimo- 
ny strongest for the latter date ; internal evidence for 
the earlier. Best statement of the argument for the 
earlier date, Guericke, Introduction to New Testament, 
and Stuart, Introduction to Apocalypse. Best for the 
later date, Alford and Wordsworth, Greek Testament 
with Notes. 

A regular allegorical poem, as well as a book of 
prophecy. Its symbols are not confined to specific 
historic events, but tfrey all have " springing and ger- 
minant accomplishment throughout many ages, the 
height and fulness of them " belonging to the great 
final judgment ; like the prophecy against Edom, in 
Isaiah xxxiv. 1-8. See especially vs. 2 and 5. 

The plan of the Apocalypse indicated in i. 19. 

I. The things which thou seest, — the vision of Christ 
in his glorified body in the midst of the churches. 

II. -III. The things ivhich are, — the condition of 
the seven churches. Symbolic as well as literal. 

IV.-XXII. The things which shall he hereafter, — 
the Prophetic Future. 



THE REVELATION OF ST. JOHN. 497 

IV.-VII. General, exhibiting the forces on the side 
of the saints in opposition to the persecutors. 

IV. God on his throne. 

V. The lamb with the book of fate. 

VI. Seven seals, the methods by which persecutors 
in all times will be destroyed ; vs. 1, 2, the conqueror ; 
vs. 3-5, war ; vs. 5, 6, famine ; vs. 7, 8, pestilence ; vs. 
9-11, prayer of the saints for the great final judgment, 
and the acceptance of the prayer ; vs. 12-17, the great 
final judgment itself. 

VII. Perfect safety of the saints amid all the preced- 
ing judgments. 

VIII. -XL — Under the opening of the seventh seal, 
the overthrow of the first great persecuting power, 
that of Judaism, symbolized by the city of Jerusalem, 
xi. 1, 2, 8. 

VIII. -IX. Seven trumpets, process of the over- 
throw. 

X. A magnificent episode, limiting the time. 

XI. The final result. 

XII. Birth and early preservation of Christianity, 
symbolized in the history of the infancy and childhood 
of Jesus. 

XIIL-XIX. Overthrow of the second great per- 
secuting power, symbolized by the city of Rome, 
xvii. 18. 

XIII. -XVI. Overthrow of Pagan Rome, considered 
as a persecuting power. 

XIII. The beast, the world-power, as a persecutor. 
The false prophet, the power of superstition, aiding 
the world-power in its work of persecution. 

XIV. The lamb and his forces. 

32 



498 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

XV.-XVI. Seven vials, process of the overthrow 
of the pagan persecuting power. 

XVII. -XIX. Rome in another form, — the persecut- 
ing Papacy. 

XYII The harlot riding on the beast, the apostate 
Papal church, using the world-power in aid of its own 
purposes of persecution. 

XVIIL-XIX. Process and completeness of her over- 
throw. 

XX. 1-6. Resurrection and judgment of the mar- 
tyrs and the persecutors (see Daniel xii. 2). The Mil- 
lennium. 

XX. 7-XXII. Another rebellion and struggle, final 
and complete triumph of good over evil, — the last 
great day of judgment. 

APOCRYPHAL REVELATIONS. 

The Apocryphal Revelations, as a general fact, are 
the poorest specimens of the Apocryphal Literature. 
In nothing has the human mind more strikingly exhib- 
ited its own imbecility than in its attempts to imitate 
or counterfeit the divine revelations. Prof. Stuart in 
his Commentary on the Apocalypse, vol. i. pp. 36-127, 
and 475-504, has given an elaborate account, with 
specimens, of several of these works ; and Tischendorf 
in his admirable manner published seven of them at 
Leipsic in 1866, of which the most interesting are, 1, 
Revelations of Moses; 2, of Ezra; 3, of Paul; and 4, 
of John, all in Greek, and much better edited than any 
of the preceding editions. 

Among the best attempts of this sort are the Sibyline 
Oracles, the Book of Enoch, the Second Book of Es 




JEWS' PLACE OF WAILING. 



THE APOCRYPHAL REVELATIONS. 499 

drag as it stands in the Apocrypha of our English Bi- 
bles, and the Shepherd of Hermas ; while among the 
poorest are the four which I have named as pub- 
lished by Tischendorf. Of the Shepherd of Her- 
mas already a sufficient specimen has been given in the 
section on the Apocryphal Epistles. 

The Second Book of Esdras, as it stands in the En- 
glish Apocrypha, with the exception of the first two 
chapters and the last two, which are interpolations of 
a later date, was written very near the time when 
John saw his Apocalypse. It is one of the best attempts 
at apocalyptic writing by an uninspired pen, and I 
earnestly commend it as such to the reader's particu- 
lar attention; but as it is printed in all the English 
Bibles which contain the Apocrypha, there is no neces- 
sity for making an extract from it here. 

THE REVELATION OP PAUL. 

This book was known to Augustin, who speaks of 
it (in Joan. Tract. 98) with great contempt, affirms that 
no church received it, that it 'vas full of the most fool- 
ish fables, and that it professed to give utterance to 
the words which Paul himself said were not lawful or 
possible for man to utter. The church historian Sozo- 
men, who wrote somewhat less than a century after 
Augustin, speaks of the book in the following terms : 
" The Apocalypse of the apostle Paul, though rejected 
by the ancients, is §till esteemed by most of the monks. 
Some persons affirm that the book was found during 
this reign (that is of Theodosius) by divine revelation, 
in a marble box, buried beneath the soil, in the house 
of Paul, at Tarsus, in Cilicia. I have been informed that 



500 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

this report is false, by a presbyter at Tarsus, a man of 
very advanced age, as is indicated by his grey hairs. 
He says that the rumor was probably devised by her- 
etics." Sozomen, Ecc. Hist. vii. 21. 

The oldest manuscript which Tischendorf finds is 
the Codex Ambrosianus, which he decides not to be 
earlier than the fifteenth century. There are, however, 
ancient translations of the book into the Coptic, Arabic, 
and Syriac ; and our American missionaries discovered 
at Oroomiah a very ancient version in manuscript, 
which was skillfully translated into English by Rev. 
Justin Perkins, D. D., and published in 1865, in the 
eighth volume of the Journal of the American Oriental 
Society. It is from this translation of Dr. Perkins that 
we make the following extracts : 

APOCALYPSE OF PAUL. 

Revelation of the holy apostle Paul, which was revealed 
to him when he ascended to the third heaven, and was 
caught up into paradise, and heard words unspeak- 
able. 

"A certain most worthy man dwelling in the city of 
Tarsus in the house of the holy Paul the apostle, in 
the reign of Theodosius the pious emperor, and of the 
most illustrious Gratian, an angel of the Lord was re- 
vealed to him saying, Break up the foundation of this 
house, and what thou findest take away. And the 
man did not understand ; he 'thought it was a lying 
dream, and paid no attention. And again he returned 
to him a second time and urged him, saying, I say unto 
thee, man, pull down all the foundation of this house 
and see every thing that thou findest in it ; take it and 



THE APOCRYPHAL REVELATIONS. 501 

make it known unto the sons of men, that they may 
turn from the evil way unto life." 

" Then that man arose in wrath, and pulled down 
the building, and dug up the foundation, and found a 
box of white glass, and in it was that which the saint 
saw and wrote, namely Paul the apostle, the blessed 
and divine, with his sandals placed by the side of this 
Revelation — those sandals he used to wear on his feet 
at the time of prayer — and his cloak folded up, with 
this Revelation. When he found them he brought 
them unto a judge, thinking there was something of 
gold within. And he carried it, still sealed, to king 
Theodosius; and that faithful and righteous king 
opened it, and he saw thus inscribed : Unto you I say, 
sinners, for your sake God descended from heaven, 
and took a body from the Holy Ghost, and was hung 
upon a tree, that he might make you free from sin. 
And I sent unto you my just and righteous servants, 
that ye might turn unto the way of truth ; but some 
of them ye killed, and some of them ye stoned, while 
they were preaching unto you the truth. But ye be- 
lieved not all these. And I gave unto you a sacra- 
ment (mystery) for the repentance of life, and ye re- 
pented not. Now, understand and behold this Reve- 
lation : and repent of your wicked ways, and of eve- 
rything which is hateful in the world. Now ye see 
the torments which are recorded in this Revelation ; 
and every one who turneth not to the way of repent- 
ance shall be thus tormented. Hitherto ye have said : 
We have not known. Now, behold, ye see everything 
which is recorded. Thus Christ gave this vision unto 
the great and blessed apostle Paul ; who, so long as 



502 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

he was in the world, taught and preached ; and now 
also, in this Revelation, He hath made known unto 
him that the sons of men should turn through him ; 
after his death by this Revelation should they be in- 
structed. Be astonished, my beloved, at this man 
of wonders ! How much he loved his Lord ! And he 
concealed not from him even one thing of what took 
place ; not in regard to the righteous, nor in regard to 
the wicked. 

Look on this, ye sons of men, and see that every- 
thing which God has created has a zeal for him ; but 
the sons of men forget him. It is not proper that we 
forget the long-suffering of God unto us, every day. 
Repent, therefore, sons of men; for the Lord is 
merciful and of tender compassion; repent of your 
wicked deeds, and praise God without ceasing, by 
night and by day. And more especially in the even- 
ing and the morning pray on account of your sins, on 
account of evil temptations and snares; for every 
creature of God praises him always in the morning ; 
and praise is becoming for him from every one. It is 
also necessary that we offer unto him good works, 
every one for himself. Everything that a man does 
from morning until evening, whether good or bad, the 
guardian angel goes forth in mourning and sorrow on 
account of men, unto God, namely he who preserves 
a mortal from all injuries ; for in the image of God is 
he, wherefore the guardianship of the sons of men is 
committed to an angel. When the angel sees a mortal 
committing wickedness, the angel is afraid of him ; for 
all the angels, guardians of the sons of men, from 
morning unto morning, go in before God, and every- 



THE APOCRYPHAL REVELATIONS. 503 

tiling that a mortal does is known ; therefore prayer is 
appointed at that time, that peradventure at the hour 
when the angel of the Lord goeth, the mortal may be 
engaged in prayer ; and they present before him the 
works of man, whatever he doeth, by day and by 
night. Remember therefore, ye sons of men, and 
praise God all your days, and especially at the time 
when the angels worship. For first do the holy angels 
run, that they may reach that hour which is appointed 
to them for service, with their companions and friends ; 
so also we, the sons of men. 

Again after these things, I saw one of the spiritual 
ones coming unto me, and he caught me by the Holy 
Ghost, and carried me to the third heaven. And the 
angel answered and said unto me : Follow me, Paul, 
that I may show unto thee the place of the saints, that 
thou mayest know whither they go, when they depart 
from the world. Then I will carry thee to the abyss 
beneath and show thee the souls of sinners, where they 
dwell after the resurrection ; that thou mayest know, 
Paul, what will be their reward. And I followed 
the angel, who made known to me all these things ; 
and he carried me above, and I looked upon the fir- 
mament of heaven ; and I saw that there w ere there 
principalities who had been in the world ; and there 
were there spirits of deception, who lead astray the 
heart of the sons of men from God ; and there are the 
evil spirits of accusation and fornication and the love 
of money, and all those things in which they walked ; 
and, behold, they are gathered for witness ; even all 
the evil spirits that are under heaven. And I saw there 
angels in whom there is no mercy ; and their faces 



504 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

were full of wrath ; every tooth they had protruded 
from their mouths, and their eyes sparkled like light- 
ning ; and the hair of their heads was thick and very 
strong ; and as it were a flame of fire proceeded from 
their mouths. And I inquired of the angel who was 
with me, and said : What are these, my Lord ? And he 
said to me : These are angels in whom there is no 
mercy, who are sent after the souls of sinners and the 
wicked, after those who had not repentance before 
they departed out of the world ; who did not believe 
our God, nor wait for his salvation, that there might 
be unto them a Helper. 

And I, Paul, groaned and I wept. Then I said un> 
to him : my Lord, wilt thou not grant that I may 
see in what manner the souls of the righteous and of 
the wicked depart out of this world ? And he said unto 
me : Paul, look down and see the thing which thou 
requestest. And I looked and saw, and beheld one 
of the sons of men fallen nigh unto death. And the 
angel said unto me : This is a just one and righteous 
in all his works. And I saw everything which he did 
for God standing before him in the hour of his depart- 
ure from the world. Then I, Paul, perceived that he 
was righteous who was now dying ; and he found for 
himself rest, even before dying. And there approach^ 
ed him wicked angels — when a righteous one departs, 
they do not find a place by him — and those good 
angels ruled over that righteous one. And they drew 
out of him the soul, while alluring it with rest ; and 
again they restored it to him, while inviting it and say- 
ing : soul, be assured, as for this thy body, holy 
one, thou wilt return into it in the resurrection, and 



THE APOCRYPHAL REVELATIONS. 505 

thou wilt receive the promises of the living God with 
all the saints. Then that soul was carried from the 
body ; and they inquired after its health, as though it 
had grown up with them ; and took delight with it in 
love; and they said unto it: Blessed art thou, hap- 
py soul, which every day didst perform the will of 
God, and now takest delight in pleasures. And there 
came to meet it he who was its guardian in its life, and 
said to it : soul of mine, be of good courage, and 
be joyful, and I will rejoice over thee that thou hast 
done the will of our Lord all the days of thy life , and 
I carried thy good works, by day and by night, before 
God. And again I turned and said to my soul : Do 
not fear, in that behold thou seest a place thou hast 
never seen. And while I was beholding these things, 
that spirit was lifted up from the earth, that it might 
ascend to heaven. And there went out to meet it 
wicked powers, those that are under heaven. And 
there reached it the spirit of error and said : Whither 
dost thou presume, soul ? and art thou running that 
thou mayest enter heaven ? Stop, that we may see , 
perhaps there is in thee something that belongs to us, 
that we may narrate a little. And that soul was bound 
there ; and there was a fight between the good angels 
and the evil angels. And when that spirit of decep- 
tion saw, it bewailed with a loud voice and said : Woe 
unto thee, soul 5 that we have found in thee nothing 
of ours ! and lo, all the angels and the spirits are help- 
ing thee against us, and behold these all are with thee ; 
thou hast passed out from us. And there went forth 
another spirit, the spirit of temper, and the spirit of 
fornication ; and they came to meet it ; and when they 



506 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

saw it, they wept over it and said : How was this soul 
escaped from us ! It did the will of God on earth, and 
behold the angels help it and pass it, and pass it along 
from us. And all the principalities and evil spirits 
came to meet it, even unto it ; and they did not find 
in it anything that was from them ; and they were not 
able to do anything to it , and they gnashed their 
teeth upon that soul and said : How hast thou escaped 
from us ? And the angel which conducted it in life 
answered and said unto them : Return, ye mortified 
ones ; ye have no way of access to it ; with many arti- 
fices ye enticed when it was on earth, and it did not 
listen to you. And after this I heard the voice of 
myriads of angels praising God and saying : Rejoice 
and be glad, soul ; be strengthened and do not fear. 
And they marvelled much at the soul, when they saw 
it holding the seal of the living God in its hand. And 
thus they were giving it heart and saying : We all re- 
joice over thee, that thou hast done the will of thy 
Lord. And they carried it and placed it before the 
throne of the living God, while they all rejoiced with 
it. And there was a great cessation ; afterwards silence 
reigned for a considerable time. And afterwards the 
angels ceased, to wit, those angels that worshipped be- 
fore the footstool of God with that soul. And there 
began the angel, who was the guide of that soul, and 
said: Lord God, merciful and compassionate, re- 
member this soul and do not forget it ; and do unto it 
according to the abundance of thy mercy and according 
to thy right judgments. And a voice was heard, say- 
ing : He is just. And the spirit of the Lord, the same 
which guided it in life, said : I am that spirit of life 



THE APOCRYPHAL REVELATIONS. 507 

that dwelt in it, and I found to myself rest. Do unto 
it, Lord, according to thy right judgments. And a 
voice was heard, saying : As that did not distress thee, 
we will not distress that ; and as it shewed mercy, we 
also will shew unto it mercy. And they committed it 
to Michael, the chief of the angels, the same who 
stands at the door of life ; and he commanded it that 
it should carry it to Paradise, to remain until the day 
on which it shall return to its body, in the resurrection ; 
and it shall take delight with its body, in that ever- 
lasting bliss and delight with the saints. And after 
this I heard a voice, saying : Righteous art thou, 
Lord, and very right thy judgments, and with thee 
there is no partiality. This was the voice of the myr- 
iads of the adoring Cherubim and the holy Seraphim. 
And I saw twenty -nine aged ones, who were adoring 
and praising and saying : Thou art righteous, Lord, 
and very right are thy judgments, and there is not 
with thee partiality ; and thou rewardest every man 
according to his works. And the angel who was with 
me answered and said : Dost thou know, Paul ? every 
man who doeth good findeth for himself rest when he 
goeth out from the world ; and everything excellent 
and good is rewarded. 

And the angel said: Look down, Paul, and see. 
And I looked down and saw, and behold another soul 
departing from the body. And I said unto him : my 
Lord, whose soul is this ? And he said unto me : Know 
thou that this man was wicked ; and he provoked God 
by day and by night, while he said : There is nothing 
else for us in the world, except that we eat and drink 
with the young. For who has gone down to hell and 



508 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

come back, or told us that there is a judgment ? And 
I saw that bitter hour ; and I saw all his wickedness 
coming before him and after him, while it encompassed 
him before his eyes ; and I saw that hour embittered 
to him from the judgment that was to come. And 
that man was saying : that I had not been born, nor 
brought forth in the world ! And I saw that the good 
angels descended to meet him, and they looked upon 
him and saw darkness encompassing him round about, 
and the foul odor of his evil deeds, so that they could 
not come nigh unto him ; and there came also those 
evil angels. When that soul saw both parties, it was 
shaken. And those good angels saw that it had not 
one good work ; and when they fled away from it, 
those evil angels took the rule over it and pulled it out 
in severe anger and haste. And when it went out, 
they turned it back three times, saying unto it : Look, 
O miserable soul, upon thy body and think of thy 
house ; as from that from which thou departest, again 
wilt thou return unto it in the day of the resurrection, 
and thou wilt be recompensed, all that is proper, for 
thy wickedness." 

This book is of a much later period and altogether 
inferior to the second book of Esdras ; and by taking 
the two and comparing them together, and then com- 
paring both with the genuine Revelation of John, the 
reader has the means of forming his own opinion as to 
the character of these Revelations respectively. 



CHAPTER THIRTEENTH 



AND CLASSICAL ORACLES. 

In connection with the Revelation of John and the 
Apocryphal Revelations, it seems desirable also to see 
what can be offered in this department by the most 
cultivated nations of pagan antiquity. The Classical 
Oracles are very different from the Apocryphal Reve- 
lations, and equally different from the divine prophe- 
cies which we have in the Bible. Let us see how the 
case stands between them. 

All early nations have had their prophets ; but the 
affirmative to the question, have there been false pro- 
phets ? is not of course the negative to the question, 
have there been true prophets ? Rather, the univer- 
sality of the false proves the necessity and actual ex- 
istence of the true ; for there is no feeling of human 
nature so universal as that which induces all men in 
every age to look for prophecy, which has not some- 
thing in the arrangements of the God of nature to 
correspond to it. That disposition to worship, which 
so universally leads uninstructed nations to idolatry, 
proves that the necessity of religion is founded deep 
in human nature, and is a strong presumptive argu- 



510 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

ment that there is a true religion adapted to this want 
of the human soul, and a true God worthy of the love 
and homage of men. The eye presupposes light, the 
sense of smell fragrance ; and every natural desire has 
in nature its appropriate object of gratification. 

The question is not, whether there have been proph- 
ets among the pagan nations ? but whether the proph- 
ets of the heathen and of the Bible are alike ? or 
whether the difference between them, is so great as to 
render it impossible to ascribe their prophetic power 
to the same source ? 

The Bible continually and earnestly asserts that there 
is a difference, and that this difference is so marked, 
that no one who has had opportunity for observing, is 
excusable for confounding the one with the other. Let 
us look at the matter as it actually existed. 

HEBREW AND PAGAN RELIGIONS. 

The Hebrews were the only people of the ancient 
world who acknowledged and worshipped one spirit- 
ual God, the Creator and Ruler of the universe. To 
sustain their attachment to this simple and pure faith 
in the midst of surrounding idolatry, there existed 
among them, in addition to the Levites who were set 
apart for the same purpose, an order of men called 
prophets, to whom the will of their God was supposed 
to be made known by immediate revelation. It was 
their business to encourage the people in their obedi- 
ence to the divine law, to instruct them when they 
erred, and to warn them when they went astray. In 
order to prove the validity of their claims to divine in- 
spiration, they professed to predict future events which 



BIBLE PROPHECIES AND CLASSICAL ORACLES. 511 

no human sagacity could foresee, and to work miracles 
which no human power could effect. 

The surrounding nations worshipped idols, and they 
also had prophets who professed to be inspired by 
those false deities. The Gentiles all acknowledged 
the God of the Hebrews to be really a God, and their 
prophets to be truly prophets ; but the difference con- 
sisted in this, that while the Hebrews affirmed their 
God to be the only true God, and their prophets the 
only true prophets, the Gentiles merely claimed that 
their gods were equal to Jehovah, and their prophets 
equal to the prophets of Jehovah (1 Kings xx. 28). 
The God of the Hebrews, in many passages of the 
Bible, reproves the pagan nations for this their error, 
and calls upon them to renounce it. For example, in 
the forty -fifth chapter of Isaiah, after a very circum- 
stantial prediction respecting Cyrus, in which that mon- 
arch is called by name, and his various achievements 
are particularly described, at least one hundred and 
fifty years before his birth ; the God of the Hebrews 
is represented as declaring that he had uttered this 
prediction for the express purpose of showing to Cy- 
rus, that Jehovah, the Self-Existent, the Everlasting 
God, was the God of Israel (Isaiah xlv. 1-7.) 

He then contrasts his creative power, his open, 
frank declarations, and his undeviating truth, with the 
crooked cunning and falsehood of the pagan deities 
(vs. 18, 19). Finally, he calls all nations to come to- 
gether, and, before them all, appeals to this prophecy 
as an instance of foreknowledge altogether beyond the 
reach of the heathen prophets, and a triumphant proof 
that he alone is the true God, and his prophets the only 



512 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

true prophets (vs. 20-22). It will be my object in . 
this chapter to follow out the train of thought here 
suggested, and by contrasting the Hebrew with the 
heathen prophets, to show that the former only have 
a just claim to divine inspiration. 

PROPHETS OF ANCIENT GREECE. 

The Grecians were the most celebrated for learning 
and refinement of all the ancient nations, and the epis- 
tles of Paul contain frequent allusions to the fame of 
their wisdom. The Greeks had their prophets, and to 
them the Greek moralists, lawgivers, and magistrates 
submitted the most important questions, and their de- 
cisions were considered sacredly binding by this pol- 
ished and philosophical people. The prophets of an- 
cient Greece, then, being the best which the heathen 
world can furnish, will be selected as the subjects of 
comparison with the prophets of the Bible. 

To enable the reader to make the comparison for 
himself, I will attempt to give a brief and faithful de- 
scription of the Greek prophets, as represented by the 
Greek historians, and of the Hebrew prophets as they 
are represented in the Bible. 

There can surely be no objection to this mode of 
investigating the subject; for it allows each nation to 
give its own account of those for whom it claims divine 
inspiration, and to whom it attributes a knowledge of 
future events. 

There was one class of sacred persons among the 
ancient Greeks called theomantes, who may, in some 
respects, be compared with the Hebrew prophets. 
They seem to have united in their occupation the 



BIBLE PROPHECIES AND CLASSICAL ORACLES. 513 

character of itinerant preacher and fortune-teller ; for 
they rambled through the country, giving people ad- 
vice in regard to their moral duties, chanting passages 
of the poets, and pretending to lay open the secrets 
of futurity. But they never ventured on predictions, 
till after offerings had been made and certain prescribed 
ceremonies accurately performed — the common expe- 
dient of all imposters to conceal the artifices by which 
they dupe vulgar credulity. 

Poorly qualified as these theomantes were for reli- 
gious teachers, it was to them alone that the common 
people of this celebrated nation could look for spiritual 
guidance. None of their instructions have descended 
to our times. (Compare Eichhorn's Introduction to 
the Old Testament, in German, preface to vol. iv.) 

GREEK ORACLES. 

Those, however, who can more properly be compar- 
ed with the Hebrew prophets, were the attendants on 
the various oracles. These separated themselves from 
all human society and withdrew to some solitude, where 
a thick wood, a craggy mountain, a waterfall, or a dark 
cave, might awaken the awe of their superstitious 
countrymen, and impose upon them the belief that 
there was the residence of some pagan deity. There 
they lived in mysterious retirement, and pretended to 
hold intercourse with the invisible world. Thither 
must all repair who wished to consult them ; and no 
one could obtain an answer to his inquiries, till he had 
presented gifts to the god of the place, and passed 
through various ceremonies, all calculated to put him 
in such a state of shuddering apprehension as would 
33 



514 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

prevent his detecting an imposition, or suspecting the 
artifice of which he was made the dupe. The responses 
were then given, artfully expressed in hexameter verse 
by poets hired for that purpose ; but their language 
is so chosen, that it is always more or less equivocal 
and often unintelligible. Many of these oracles or 
prophecies have been preserved by the Greek histori- 
ans, though no two writers, when they profess to re- 
cord the same oracle, ever give it in precisely the same 
words. 

We have enough of these remains to enable us to 
form an estimate of the subjects, which were usually 
•laid before the Greek prophets, and of the manner in 
which they disposed of them. Religion or morality 
is very seldom mentioned. They were principally oc- 
cupied about public enterprise, emigrations, wars, and 
controversies between states and individuals. When 
disputes were to be settled by them, they were often 
bribed by one party to give sentence against the other ; 
if they desired to keep in favor with both, they would 
procrastinate and evade the question. When the issue 
of public enterprises was demanded, they sometimes 
learned from men of experience in public affairs what 
reply it would be most safe to give ; or their answers 
were so artfully couched, that they could bear opposite 
meanings. If these expedients failed, they referred 
the inquirer to the superstitious arts of magic and 
.astrology ; or they evaded the point by railery, and 
instead of instructing by prophecy, amused or irritated 
by sarcasm ; and when every source of cunning was ex- 
hausted, they would say that their god was angry and 
refused to answer. What is remarkable in all their 



BIBLE PROPHECIES AND CLASSICAL ORACLES. 515 

prophecies is, they seldom, if ever, have any good moral 
tendency. Virtue is not rewarded, nor vice punished. 
Power is flattered, however unjust ; and weakness is 
left unprotected, however innocent. The grossest 
idolatry is always inculcated ; and in many instances, 
the horrid superstition of sacrificing human beings to 
the infernal gods is expressly enjoined. 

An extravagant pecuniary reward was generally the 
only condition on which these pretended prophecies 
could be obtained. 

Every part of this description of the Greek prophets 
can be verified by quotations from the Greek histori- 
ans. (Compare Potter's Antiquities of Greece, Book 
ii. chap. 7-12.) 

ORACLES OF APOLLO AND TROPHONIUS. 

It is obvious from history, that some of the most 
celebrated of the Greek oracles owed their celebrity 
to exhilarating or stupefying gases issuing from sub- 
terranean caverns. Of all the oracles of ancient 
Greece, none was more confided in than that of Apollo 
at Delphi. The manner of its discovery is thus related 
by Diodorus Siculus (Book xvi.) : " Upon mount 
Parnassus, where goats were wont to feed, there was 
a deep cavern with a small narrow mouth, to which 
when any of the goats approached, they began imme- 
diately to leap after a most unusual and antic manner, 
uttering strange and unheard of sounds. The goat- 
herd observing this, and wondering what could be 
the cause of it, went himself to view the cavern, where- 
upon he also was seized with a like fit of madness, 
leaping and dancing, and foretelling things to come." 



516 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

The effect of this gas on the officiating priestess, is 
thus described by archbishop Potter in the work already 
quoted: u She was no sooner inspired, but she began 
immediately to swell and foam at the mouth, tearing 
her hair, cutting her flesh, and in all her other behav- 
ior appearing like one frantic and distracted." In 
some instances the paroxysm was so violent as to occa- 
sion immediate death. 

Pausanias informs us that "he who desired to con- 
sult the oracles of Trophonius's cave at Lebadea in 
Boeotia, was obliged to undergo various preparatory 
ceremonies, which continued through several days : he 
was to purify himself by various methods, and to offer 
sacrifices to many different deities ; he was then con- 
ducted by night to a neighboring river, where he was 
anointed and washed ; he afterwards drank of the wa- 
ters of forgetfulness, that his former cares might be 
buried ; and of the waters of remembrance, that he 
might forget nothing of what he was to see. The 
cave was surrounded by a wall ; it resembled an oven ; 
was four cubits wide and eight deep ; it was descended 
by a ladder ; and he who went down carried with him 
cakes made of honey ; when he was got down he was 
made acquainted with futurity." (See Beloe's Hero- 
dotus, vol. i. p. 36.) 

He was always pale and dejected on his return, and 
thence it became proverbial to say of a melancholy 
man, that he had consulted the oracle of Trophonius. 

It was in contrast with oracles such as these that Je- 
hovah declares, I have not spoken in secret, in a dark 
'place of the earth : and in contrast with the difficulty 
of obtaining the oracular responses, and their ambigu- 



BIBLE PROPHECIES AND CLASSICAL ORACLES. 517 

ous and unintelligible language when obtained, (which 
we shall now proceed to notice), that he makes the ad- 
ditional declarations: I said not to the seed of Jacob, 
seek ye me in vain. I the Lord speak righteousness, I 
declare things that are right: that is, as bishop Lowth 
translates it, "I speak truth and give direct answers." 
(Isa. xlv. 19). 

The time of consulting the Delphic oracle was origin- 
ally only during one month of the year, and generally 
on the seventh day of the month, that being consid- 
ered Apollo's birthday ; and when responses were 
given most frequently, they could never be obtained 
oftener than once a month. 

"Whoever went to consult the oracle," says Potter, 
u was required to make large presents to the god, where- 
by it came to pass that this temple, in riches, splendor 
and magnificence, was superior to almost all others in 
the world." " It was the custom also to offer sacrifices 
to Apollo, in which except the omens were favorable, 
the prophetess would not give an answer. At the 
sacrifices there were five priests that assisted the proph- 
ets, and another priest also that assisted the prophetess 
in managing the oracle." (Potter's Antiquities of 
Greece, Bookii. chap. d. y 

As those priests were the sole judges of the omens, 
it was very easy for them to evade every question 
respecting which it might be inexpedient for them to 
commit themselves. 

Among the presents which Croesus sent to this ora- 
cle, Herodotus (B. i. c. 50, 51) enumerates the follow- 
ing, " one hundred and seventeen tiles of gold, four 
of which were of the purest gold, each weighing one 



518 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

talent and a half; the rest of inferior quality, but of 
the weight of two talents ; also a lion of pure gold, 
weighing ten talents ; two large vessels or goblets, one 
of gold and the other of silver, the former weighing 
nearly nine talents, and the latter containing six hun- 
dred amphorae ; a female statue of gold, three cubits 
high," and many other things of equal value. 

To the oracle of Amphiarus in Thebes he also sent 
u a shield of solid gold, with a strong spear made en- 
tirely of gold, both shaft and head. These were all, 
(continues Herodotus) within my memory, preserved 
at Thebes, in the temple of the Ismenian Apollo." 

They who consulted this oracle of Amphiarus, were 
to abstain from wine for three days, and from all 
nourishment for twenty-four hours. They then sacrificed 
a ram, on the skin of which they lay down to sleep, 
and received responses in their dreams. 

CHARACTER OF THE ORACULAR RESPONSES. 

The general character of the oracular responses is 
described by the pagan Cicero, with entire fidelity, in 
the following paragraph from his work de Divinatione 
(ii. 56). 

u But now I come to thee, sacred Apollo, who dwell- 
est at the centre of the earth, whence first proceeded 
the wild and superstitious sound.* For Chrysippus 
has filled a whole volume with thy oracles, partly false, 
as I think ; and sometimes true by mere accident, as 
it frequently so happens in other cases ; and sometimes 



*Sed jam ad te venio, 
Sancte Apollo, qui umbilicum certum terrarum obsides, 
Unde superstitiosa primum saeva evasit vox fera. 



BIBLE TROPHECIES AND CLASSICAL ORACLES. 519 

enigmatical and obscure, so that the interpreter needs 
to be interpreted, and the response referred back to 
the oracle ; and often purposely and artificially ambig- 
uous. For when this response came to the richest king 
of Asia, " Croesus by crossing the Halys shall destroy 
a great power," he supposed that he was to destroy the 
power of the enemy, but he destroyed his own. 
Whatever might have been the event, therefore, the 
oracle would have remained true." 

Herodotus informs us (B. i. c. 91) that when Croesus, 
after his defeat, made complaint to the priestess of 
Apollo, that she had deceived him in the oracle re- 
ferred to in this passage of Cicero, she replied, u that 
Croesus was not justified in his complaints ; for Apollo 
had declared, that if he made war against the Persians, 
a mighty empire would be overthrown ; the real pur- 
port of which communication, if he had been anxious 
to understand, it became him to have inquired wheth- 
er the god alluded to his empire, or to the empire of 
Cyrus ; but that not understanding the reply which 
had been made, nor condescending to make a second 
inquiry, he had been himself the cause of his own mis- 
fortune." By this evasion, the unfortunate king found 
that he had been outwitted, and was obliged to submit 
in silence. 

To illustrate still further the nature of the subjects 
which were usually laid before the Greek prophets, 
and the manner in which they disposed of them, the 
following examples are selected from Herodotus. 

On a certain occasion the Lacedemonians, says Her- 
odotus, " dissatisfied with the languor and inactivity 
of peace, and conceiving themselves, in all respects 2 



520 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

superior to the Tegeans, they sent to consult the oracle 
concerning the entire conquest of Arcadia. The Py- 
thian thus answered them : 

Ask ye Arcadia ? 'tis a bold demand, 
A rough and hardy race defend the land. 
Repulsed by them, one only boon you gain, 
With frequent foot to dance on Tegea's plain, 
And o'er her fields the meas'ring cord to strain."* 

"No sooner had the Lacedemonians received this 
reply than, leaving the other parts of Arcadia unmo- 
lested, they proceeded to attack the Tegeans, carrying 
a quantity of fetters with them. They relied on the 
evasive declaration of the oracle, and imagined that 
they should infallibly reduce the Tegeans to servitude. 
They engaged them and were defeated : as many as 
were taken captive were loaded with the fetters which 
themselves had brought, and were thus employed in 
laborious service in the fields of the Tegeans." (B.. 
i. c. 66). 

The Lacedemonians, after having been repeatedly 
defeated by the Tegeans, again sent to consult the 
Delphic oracle. "The Pythian (says Herodotus) as- 
sured them of success, if they brought back the body 
of Orestes, son of Agamemnon. Unable to discover 
his tomb, they sent a second time to inquire concern- 
ing the place of his interment. The following was the 
oracular communication : 

* The above is Beloe's translation. Literally rendered, the latter 
part of the oracle reads thus : " But I will not refuse you. I will 
grant you to dance on Tegea, struck with your feet, and to allot the 
fine soil with the cord." 



BIBLE PROPHECIES AND CLASSICAL ORACLES. 521 

A plain within the Arcadian land I know, 
Where double winds with forced exertion blow, 
Where form to form with mutual strength replies, 
And ill by other ills supported lies : 
That earth contains the great Atrides' son ; 
Take him and conquer : Tegea then is won." 

I give the oracle in the translation of Beloe, but the 
last line, on which the import of the whole depends, 
literally rendered, reads thus : 

Having taken him (that is, the body of Orestes), 
thou shalt be a helper of Tegea. 

The Lacedemonians were as much in the dark as 
ever in respect to the place where they might find the 
body of Orestes, but they continued their search for 
it without intermission. At length one of their dis- 
tinguished countrymen named Lichas, being in Arca- 
dia on public business, and happening to visit a smith 
at his forge, observed with particular curiosity the 
process of working the iron. The man took notice 
of his attention, and desisted from his labor. " Stranger 
of Sparta, said he, you seem to admire the art which 
you contemplate ; but how much more would you be 
excited, if you knew all that I am able to communi- 
cate ! Near this place, as I was sinking a well, I found 
a coffin seven cubits long. I never believed that men 
were formerly of larger dimensions than at present , 
but when I opened it, I discovered a body equal in 
length to the coffin. I correctly measured it, and re- 
placed it where I found it." 

"Lichas, after hearing this relation, was induced to 
believe that this was the body of Orestes, concerning 
which the oracle had spoken. He was further per- 



522 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

suaded, when lie recollected that the bellows of the 
smith might intimate the two winds ; the anvil and the 
hammer might express one form opposing another ; 
the iron also which was beaten, might signify ill suc- 
ceeding ill, rightly conceiving that the use of iron 
operated to the injury of mankind." 

The Spartans by stratagem got possession of the 
bones, and Tegea was conquered. (Herodotus, B. i 
c. 68). 

Both the above oracles, particularly in the original 
Greek, are entirely ambiguous, and would have been 
equally true in each case, whether the Spartans or 
Tegeans had conquered. They also sanction glaring 
injustice, for it is not even intimated to the Spartans, 
that their projected unprovoked attack on the peace- 
ful Tegeans, for the sake of robbing them of their 
lands and making them slaves, was contrary to every 
principle of right. Nor does the historian himself 
seem to think it wrong for the Spartans to make war 
because they were tired of peace, nor a defect in the 
oracle that it has nothing to say on the subject of 
moral obligation. Politics, and not religion, war and 
revenge, not peace and good-will, were the topics most 
acceptable to the prophets of ancient Greece. 

Herodotus also (B. vii. c. 140-142) details the ora- 
cles given to the Athenians, respecting the issue of the 
Persian invasion ; and also several others in different 
parts of his history. They are all of the same general 
character with those already described. 

It is well known, that the Greek oracles were fre- 
quently bribed by public men to give such answers as 
would promote their own schemes. Plutarch informs 



BIBLE PROPHECIES AND CLASSICAL ORACLES. 523 

us, in his life of Thenristocles, that this general, "per- 
ceiving that he could not, by the force of human rea- 
son, prevail with the multitude, set his machinery to 
work as a poet would do in a tragedy, and had recourse 
to prodigies and oracles ;" and Demosthenes publicly 
complained, that the Delphic oracle, being bribed by 
Philip, philipized. "He put the Thebans in mind of 
Epaminondas, and the Athenians of Pericles, how they 
reckoned such things (as oracles and prodigies) the 
mere pretexts of cowardice, and pursued the plan 
which their reason had dictated." (Plutarch's Life of 
Demosthenes). 

Such was the estimation in which the Greek oracles 
were held by the most intelligent of the Greeks them- 
selves. And do you not in this description of the 
Greek prophets, as given by the Greek historians, plain- 
ly discover all the features of selfishness, imposture, 
and crime ? 

How easy for these pretended prophets to deceive, 
if they chose ; and how much their whole system of 
operations appears like an attempt to conceal a profit- 
able fraud ! Doubtless the phenomena known in mod- 
ern times as mesmerism, clairvoyance, and spiritism, 
had much to do with the workings and the success of 
the ancient oracles. 

Surely, "they have no knowledge that set up the 
wood of their graven image and pray unto a god that 
cannot save. He feedeth on ashes ; a deceived heart 
hath turned him aside, that he cannot deliver his soul, 
nor say, is there not a lie in my right hand ?." (Isaiah 
xlv. 20 ; xliv. 20). 



524 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE, 



MANNERS AND CHARACTER OF THE HEBREW PROPHETS. 

From this scene of pagan imposture and credulity, 
let us now turn to the prophets of the Bible. In every 
respect we find them the reverse of those just describ- 
ed. They sought no concealment, and affected no 
mystery ; but mingled with society, and lived generally 
like other men. They were at all times and in all 
places accessible to such as craved their advice, and 
this they freely imparted without exacting gifts to grat- 
ify their own avarice, or requiring ceremonies to work 
on the fears of those who consulted them. No arts 
were resorted to, to deceive others into a mysterious 
dread of their sacredness. It is true, that they some- 
times used striking symbolic representations, but it was 
to awaken the attention of a sensual and thoughtless 
people to listen to their instructions. (Isaiah xx. 2-4). 

They were sometimes seen in the habiliments of 
mourning ; but it was to manifest the depth of the 
grief they felt for the sin and the obstinacy of their 
nation. 

In their prophecies there was neither artifice, eva- 
sion, nor ambiguity ; but they were prompt, direct, 
and decisive. On all occasions of great public interest, 
they w r ere seen in the most frequented places, enforc- 
ing their instructions with the most sincere and impas- 
sioned eloquence upon the listening throngs who sur- 
rounded them. These public addresses they frequently 
committed to writing, and we have them in every form, 
from the simplest prose to the most lofty elevation of 
poetry. The writings of the Hebrew prophets which 
have descended to us, are so full and complete, that 



BIBLE PROPHECIES AND CLASSICAL ORACLES. 525 

we have every facility for ascertaining the usual sub- 
jects and general character of their prophecies. 

SUBJECTS AND CHARACTER OF THEIR PROPHECIES. 

Religion was the great subject on which they loved 
to dwell, and with them religion was neither an empty 
sound nor a superstitious ceremonial. The love and 
worship of one spiritual and holy God, obedience to 
his law, purity of heart, as the most acceptable sacri- 
fice, (an idea beyond even the imagination of a hea- 
then prophet) ; these constituted the religion of the 
Hebrew prophets. It was in contemplation of subjects 
6uch as these, that their spirits moved with rapture, 
rose on the wings of a holy enthusiasm to the very 
throne of the Majesty on high, which no mortal eye 
but theirs had ever seen, and no mortal tongue but 
theirs had ever dared to celebrate. 

In all their prophecies, it was their constant aim to 
exert the most salutary moral influence. Calamity 
they always threatened as the punishment of sin, and 
prosperity was the sure reward of holy obedience. To 
the corruptions of their times, they presented inde- 
pendent, bold, and unyielding opposition; ungodly 
rulers, they fearlessly withstood, by severe and public 
rebuke ; and when kings and people united to abolish 
or disregard the laws of God, these holy men came 
forth (though hatred, persecution, imprisonment, and 
death were often the reward of their fidelity) with 
direct, unequivocal, and solemn declarations of their 
own abhorrence of such evil designs and of the divine 
vengeance against them. Superstitious arts calculated 
to impose on the credulity of an ignorant multitude, 



526 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

such as astrology, magic, and necromancy, they point- 
edly condemned; and the rich presents which were 
offered them, they rejected. Their predictions of 
future events were public, clear, impossible to be mis- 
apprehended, and such as no human foresight could 
have conjectured. 

ILLUSTRATIONS FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

You scarcely need be referred to instances of 
what has now been advanced, for they occur so fre- 
quently on the pages of the Old Testament, that one 
who has any acquaintance with the Bible, will be at no 
loss to verify this description of the Biblical prophets. 

You will at once remember how Elisha repelled the 
princely offers of Naaman ; how Isaiah publicly and 
severely rebuked the idolatrous Ahaz ; how steadfastly 
Jeremiah resisted the rebellious designs of his king and 
nation, though their reproaches and persecutions 
wounded him so deeply that he often wished for death 
to put an end to his anguish. In the whole character 
of the Hebrew prophets we see a frankness which dis- 
dained concealment, and a virtue which abhorred de- 
ception. 

In further illustration of what has been advanced 
examine 2 Sam. xii; 1 Kings xviii. 10, 17, 18; xxi. 
17-24. 

The prophet Nathan did not hesitate to pourtray in 
the liveliest colors the sin which had been committed 
by his sovereign and patron, and boldly to say to the 
guilty monarch, Thou art the man. 

The prophet Elijah knew that the tyrant Ahab had 
long been searching all the neighboring states to ap- 



BIBLE PROPHECIES AND CLASSICAL ORACLES. 527 

prehend and put him to death ; but he fearlessly stood 
before him, and when the haughty monarch accosted 
him with the question, "Art thou he that trouble th 
Israel ? " he instantly replied, " I have not troubled 
Israel ; but thou and thy father's house, in that ye have 
forsaken the commandments of the Lord ; and thou 
hast followed Baalim." 

When the same king had been guilty of another 
act of the most flagrant injustice respecting Naboth, 
the same prophet went to him with the appalling mes- 
sage : " Thus saith the Lord, In the place where dogs 
licked the blood of Naboth, shall dogs lick thy blood, 
even thine." And Ahab said to Elijah, "Hast thou 
found me, mine enemy?" And he answered, "I 
have found thee, because thou hast sold thyself to 
work evil in the sight of the Lord." Where in the 
whole compass of the heathen oracles shall we find a 
resistance to regal tyranny, a defence of injured and 
helpless innocence, to be compared with this ? 

THE CONTRAST. 

And now is not the difference between the Hebrew 
and the heathen prophets perfectly obvious ? In the 
one case we see all the machinery of fraud, a total des- 
titution of moral feeling, and every indication of an 
exclusive attachment to this world. In the other case 
we can discover no wish and no opportunity to 
deceive; we find a most acute moral sensibility 
and an inflexible adherence to what is right, and a 
total renunciation of all worldly hopes, whenever they 
interfered with the calls of duty. The former, just 
what we should expect from men of this world, who 



528 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

had no faith in another ; the latter, just what we should 
expect from men of God, who had placed all their 
hopes in heaven. Who, that has any knowledge of 
the subject, can pretend to place them on equal ground, 
or say that they have equal claims to divine inspiration ? 
In the contrast, the interpreter of the Greek oracles, 
stands abashed before the Hebrew prophet, like the 
witch of Endor before the rising spirit of Samuel. 

How shall we account for it, that the Hebrews, who 
were so far below the Greeks in learning, refine- 
ment, and power, should rise so far above them in the 
character of their religious teachers ? To the Hebrews 
were sent holy men of God, ivho spake as they were 
moved by the Holy Ghost ; while the Greeks, seeking 
after wisdom, became vain in their imagination, and 
their foolish heart ivas darkened. 

Deficiency in religious feeling, and not the want of 
appropriate and sufficient evidence, is, after all, the 
great cause of scepticism in respect to the inspiration 
of the Bible. In the stillness of a Sabbath morning, 
when, if ever, the soul loves to commune with heaven, 
let the devout man open the sacred volume, and read till 
his heart glows with something of the fervor of the 
inspired writers, and while his affections are flowing 
with full tide towards the God of the Hebrew patri- 
archs and prophets, let him lay aside the Bible, and 
suddenly turn his attention to any, even the most lofty 
flights of heathen inspiration, and the painful revul- 
sion of feeling which he experiences, shows him at once 
that he has changed his element, that he has fallen 
upon another world. The angels who were sent to 
warn Lot of his danger, could scarcely have found a 



BIBLE PROPHECIES AND CLASSICAL ORACLES. 529 

greater contrast when they left the courts of heaven, 
to tread the polluted streets of Sodom. The devout 
man, who reads the prophetic parts of the Old Testa- 
ment, with one spark of the feeling with which they 
were composed, no more needs a philosophical proof of 
their divine origin, than Elijah needed a metaphysical 
demonstration of the existence of God, while ascend- 
ing to heaven in his fiery chariot ; and I suppose no 
one will consider it a breach of charity to say, that it 
is not by devout men, generally, that the divine author- 
ity of the Old Testament is called in question. 

FULFILLMENT OF PROPHECY. 

In further illustration of this subject, we will now 
notice a few of the more remarkable prophecies of the 
Bible, which with their fulfillment, the reader is re- 
quested to compare with the Greek prophecies intro- 
duced in this chapter. 

1. Predictions respecting Cyrus, Isaiah xliv., xlv. 

About one hundred and fifty years before the birth 
of Cyrus, the Hebrew prophet Isaiah described this 
monarch by name,* and intimated (Isaiah xlv. 4) that 
this was his surname, and not the name given him at 
his birth ; accurately foretold the victories he was to 
achieve, and the benefits which he was to confer upon 
the Jewish people, by delivering them from the Baby- 

* Herodotus informs us (B. i. c. 114) that Cyrus was not the orig- 
inal name of this monarch, but one which he assumed at a later peri- 
od, probably on his accession to the throne, or after the achievement 
of some of his great victories. In the Hebrew the name is written 
Koraesk, and in the Pehlvi or ancient Persian, Korshid, which, means 
sun-glory, or splendor like that of the sum, (See Jahn's Heb. Com. 
p. 148.) 

34 



530 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Ionian captivity. This prophecy was published nearly 
a century before Nebuchadnezzar subdued Judea. 
Babylon was then but just rising into notice ; the very 
existence of the empire was scarcely known to the 
Hebrews; Persia, the native country of Cyrus, was 
yet in the darkness of barbarism ; while Judea was an 
old, established and powerful kingdom. The accom- 
phishment of this prediction, therefore, would appear 
to the politicians of that age as improbable, as it would 
now appear to our politicians, if they were told that 
these United States in the course of a century would 
fall under the dominion of one of the new and still 
tottering republics of South America, and would finally 
be delivered from their bondage by a powerful mon- 
arch of the Pacific Islands. To this prophecy Jeho- 
vah appeals (as has been already observed), as an in- 
stance of foreknowledge altogether beyond the reach 
of the heathen prophets, and a triumphant proof, that 
he alone is the true God, and his prophets the only 
true prophets. 

" Assemble yourselves (says he) and come, draw 
near together ye that are escaped of the nations : they 
have no knowledge that set up the wood of their graven 
image, and pray unto a god that can not save. Tell 
ye, and bring them near ; yea, let them take counsel 
together, who hath declared this from ancient time ? 
have not I the Lord ? and there is no God else besides 
me ; a just God and a Saviour, there is none besides 
me. Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of 
the earth; for I am God, and there is none else." 
(Isaiah xlv. 20, 21). 

2. Predictions respecting Babylon. 



BIBLE PROPHECIES AND CLASSICAL ORACLES. 531 

In close connection with the preceding are the pre- 
dictions of Isaiah and Jeremiah respecting the over- 
throw of Babylon, the fulfillment of which we will 
now consider. Ot these predictions that of Isaiah was 
uttered one hundred and sixty years, and that of Jere- 
miah fifty-six years before the event. (Compare Jer. 
1., li.) The historical proof on this subject is entirely 
conclusive, and will be exhibited in its proper place, 
when we come to the discussion of the authenticity of 
the prophetic writings of Isaiah and Jeremiah. It can 
not be said, therefore, with any show of reason, that 
these prophecies were written after the events. 

The circumstantial particularity of these predictions, 
their antecedent improbabilities, their progressive ac- 
complishment through a long series of ages, and the 
great variety of the events predicted, render it equally 
impossible to account for these prophecies on the 
ground that they were sagacious and happy con- 
jectures. 

To enable the reader to make the comparison for 
himself, I will exhibit the predictions in the words of 
the prophets, and in parallel columns the account of 
the events in the words of the classic historians, relying 
principally on Herodotus and Xenophon. The first of 
these historians lived two hundred and fifty years after 
Isaiah and one hundred and fifty after Jeremiah, and 
the latter three hundred and fifty after Isaiah and two 
hundred and fifty after Jeremiah. 

Babylon was considered impregnable. Its high and 
strong walls surmounted by lofty towers, its broad and 
deep ditches, its large magazines, and the numerous 
squares within the city, which were planted with corn 



532 



THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE 



and yielded an annual supply of provisions, seemed 
sufficient to secure the inhabitants forever from all at- 
tacks of their enemies. (Jahn's Heb. Com. p. 152.) 

Some of the more remarkable circumstances of its 
capture and subsequent fate, exhibiting the coincidence 
between prophecy and history, are the following : 

The besieging army to consist of various nations. 



PROPHECY. 

Go up, Elam, besiege, 
Media (Isaiah xxi. 2). 

The noise of a multitude 
in the mountains, like as 
of a great people ; a tumul- 
tuous noise of the king- 
doms of nations gathered 
together : the Lord of hosts 
numbereth the host of the 
battle. They come from a 
far country, from the end 
of heaven (Isa. xiii. 4, 5). 

Set ye up a standard in 
the land, blow the trumpet 
among the nations, prepare 
the nations against her, call 
together against her the 
kingdom of Ararat, Minni, 
and Ashchenaz ; appoint a 
captain against her ; cause 
the horses to come up as 
the rough caterpillars. 

Prepare against her the 



HISTORY. 

While Cyrus was on his 
march to Babylon, we find 
him issuing the following 
orders to his troops : " Let 
Artabazus lead the Persian 
(Elam)shieldmen and arch- 
ers ; after these let Andra- 
mias the Mede, lead the 
Median foot ; after these, 
Embas, the Armenian (Ara- 
rat) foot ; After these, Ar- 
tuchas, the Hyrcanians ; af- 
ter these, Thambradas, the 
Sacian foot; after these, 
Damades, the Cadusians." 
u And do you all attend 
ready on the road to Bab- 
ylon, each of you with all 
things proper" (Xenophon, 
Cyrop. B. v. c. iii. 38). 

While the army lay at 
Babylon, there are men- 
tioned among his soldiers, 



BIBLE PROPHECIES AND CLASSICAL ORACLES. 533 

nations, with the kings of in addition to the above, 

the Medes, the captains the Phrygians, Lydians, 

thereof and all the rulers Arabians, and Cappadoci- 

thereof (Jer. li. 27, 28). ans (lb. B. vii. c. v. 15). 

The Hebrew name Elam corresponds to the Greek 
Persia, and Ararat and Minni to Armenia and the neigh- 
boring northern countries ; the locality of Ashkenaz, 
is less certain. 

The river to be dried up, the gates to be left open, and 
the city taken by surprise during a night of revelry and 
darkness. 

The reader should recollect, that the river Euphrates 
passed through the midst of Babylon ; and that besides 
the external wall, there was a wall on each side of the 
river, and the only entrance to the city from the river 
was by brazen gates, which were carefully closed every 
night. The river here was a quarter of a mile in 
width and more than twelve feet deep. (Herodotus, 
B. i. c. 180, 181.) 

PROPHECY. HISTORY. 

God saith to the deep, Cyrus placed one detach- 

Be dry, and I will dry up ment of his forces where 

thy rivers (Isa. xliv. 27). the river first enters the 

A drought is upon her city, and another where 

waters and they shall be it leaves it, directing them 

dried up (Jer. 1. 38). to enter the channel, and 

I will dry up her sea and attack the town, wherever 

make her springs dry (Jer. a passage could be effected, 

li. 36). He pierced the bank and 

I will loose the loins of introduced the river into 

kings to open before him the lake, by which means 



534 



THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE 



the two-leaved gates, and 
the gates shall not be shut 
(Isaiah xlv. 1). 

In their heat I will 
mate their feasts, and I 
will make them drunken. 
And I will make drunk 
her princes and her wise 
men, her captains and her 
rulers and her mighty 
men (Jer. li. 39, 57). 

The night of my plea- 
sure hath he turned into 
fear unto me. Prepare 
the table, watch in the 
watch-tower, eat drink : 
arise ye princes, anoint 
the shield (Isa. xxi. 4, 5). 

Therefore shall evil 
come upon thee, thou shalt 
not know from whence it 
ariseth ; and mischief shall 
fall upon thee, thou shalt 
not be able to put it off; 
and desolation shall come 
upon thee suddenly, which 
thou shalt not know (Isa. 
xlvii. 11). 

But these two things 
shall come to thee in a 
moment, in one day, the 
loss of children and wid- 



the bed of the Euphrates 
became sufficiently shal- 
low for the object in view. 
The Persians in their sta- 
tion watched the proper 
opportunity, and when the 
stream had so far retired 
as not to be higher than 
their thighs, they entered 
Babylon without difficulty. 
If the besieged had either 
been aware of the designs 
of Cyrus, or had discover- 
ed the project before its 
actual accomplishment, 
they might have effected 
the total destruction of 
these troops. They had 
only to secure the little 
gates which led to the 
river, and to have manned 
the embankments on either 
side, and they might have 
enclosed the Persians in a 
net from which they could 
never have escaped. As 
it happened they were 
taken by surprise. It was 
a day of festivity among 
them, and whilst the citi- 
zens were engaged in danc- 
ing and merriment,Babylon 



BIBLE PROPHECIES AND CLASSICAL ORACLES. 535 

owhood : they shall come was, for the first time, thus 
upon thee in their perfec- taken! (Herodotus, i. 191). 
tion, for the multitude of 
thy sorceries and for the 
abundance of thine en- 
chantments (Isa. xlvii. 9). 

By comparing the prophecy with the history, it will 
appear that every circumstance known to the historian 
after the event, had been known to the prophets long 
before. 

I will here subjoin the account of the taking of 
Babylon as given by Xenophon, which includes some 
particulars not mentioned by Herodotus. 

Cyrus "measuring out the ground around the wall, 
and from the side of the river, — he dug round the wall 
on every side a very great ditch. When he heard they 
were celebrating a festival in Babylon, in which all the 
Babylonians drank and revelled the whole night ; on 
that occasion, as soon as it grew dark, he took a num- 
ber of men with him, and opened the ditches into the 
river. When this was done, the water ran off in the 
night by the ditches, and the passage of the river 
through the city became available." "Then making 
those that attended his person, both foot and horse, to 
go down into the dry part of the river, he ordered 
them to try whether the channel of the river was pas- 
sable." They reported that it was. Cyrus then ad- 
dressed his troops, and- concluded by saying, "Do 
you Gobryas and Gadatas* show us the ways, for you 

* These were two Assyrian noblemen who had gone over to Cyrus 
on account of the cruelties practised upon them by the Babylonian 



536 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

are acquainted with them, and when we are got in, 
lead us the readiest way to the palace. It may be no 
wonder, perhaps, said they that were with Gobryas, if 
the gates of the palace are open, for the city seems to 
night to be in a general revel, but we shall meet with 
a guard at the gates, for there is always one set there." 
"When this was said, they mirched; and of those 
that they met with, some they fell on and killed, some 
fled, and some set up a clamor. They that were with 
Gobryas, set up a clamor with them, as if they were 
revellers themselves, and marching on the shortest way 
that they could, they got round about the palace." 
u As soon as the noise and clamor began, they that 
were within, perceiving the disturbance, and the king 
commanding them to examine what the matter was, 
ran out, throwing open the gates. They that were 
with Gadatas, as soon as they saw the gates loose, 
broke in. pressing forward on the runaways, and deal- 
ing their blows among them, they came up to the king, 
and found him now in a standing posture with his 
sword drawn. They that were with Gadatas and Go- 
bryas being many in number, mastered him; they 
likewise that were with him were killed." "Gadatas 
and Gobryas then came up, and having first paid their 
adoration to the gods, for the revenge they had had 
on their impious king, they then kissed the hands and 
feet of Cyrus, shedding many tears in the midst of 
their joy and satisfaction." (Cyropaed. B. vii. c. 5). 

The death of the king, as described by Xenophon, 
had been predicted by the prophet in these words : 

"But thou art cast out of thy grave as an abomina- 
ble branch, and as the raiment of those that are slain, 



BIBLE PROPHECIES AND CLASSICAL ORACLES. 537 

thrust through with the sword, that go down to the 
stones of the pit ; as a carcass trodden under feet." 
(Isaiah xiv. 19). 

The joy occasioned by his death was predicted with 
equal clearness. 

" The whole earth is at rest, and is quiet ; they break 
forth into singing. Yea, the fir-trees rejoice at thee, 
and the cedars of Lebanon, saying, Since thou art laid 
down, no feller is come up against us." (Isaiah xiv. 
7, 8). 

3. TJie place to be forever uninhabited, a dwelling of 
wild beasts, and a place of stagnant waters. 

PROPHECY. HISTORY. 

And Babylon, the glory u The Persians destroy l J 
of kingdoms, the beauty a part of the city, time and 
of the Chaldees' excellen- the negligence of the Mace- 
cy, shall be as when God donians destroyed a part." 
overthrew Sodom and Go- "It is now almost entirely 
morrah. deserted, so that we may 

It shall never be inhab- safely say of it what a cer- 
ited, neither shall it be tain poet said of Megalo- 
dwelt in from generation polis, the great city of Ar- 
to generation ; neither cadia: the great city is 
shall the Arabian pitch now a vast solitude." 
tent there ; neither shall (Strabo, B. xvi). 
the shepherds make their Babylon, once the great- 
fold there. est of all cities which the 

sun ever looked upon, has 
now nothing left but the 
walls. (Pausanias, B. viii. 
a 33). 



538 



THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE 



But wild beasts of the 
desert shall lie there ; and 
their houses shall be full 
of doleful creatures ; and 
owls shall dwell there, and 
satyrs shall dance there. 

And the wild beasts of 
the island shall lay in their 
desolate houses, and dra- 
gons in their pleasant 
palaces. (Isa. xiii. 20-22). 

And Babylon shall be- 
come heaps, a dwelling 
place for dragons, an as- 
tonishment and a hissing, 
without an inhabitant. 
They shall roar together 
like lions ; they shall yell 
as lions 7 whelps. (Jer. li. 
37, 38). 



I have learned from a 
certain Elamite brother, 
who came from those parts 
and now lives as a monk 
in Jerusalem, that the 
royal hunting grounds are 
in Babylon ; and that wild 
beasts of all kinds are kept 
within its walls." (Jerome 
Com. in Is. c. 13). 

" I soon distinguished 
that the causes of our 
alarm were two or three 
majestic lions, taking the 
air upon the heights of the 
pyramid." " We then rode 
close up to the ruins ; and 
I had once more the grat- 
ification of ascending the 
awful sides of the tower 
of Babel. In my progress 
I stopped several times to 
look at the broad prints of 
the feet of the lions, left 
plain in the clayey soil; 
and by the track, I saw 
that if we had chosen to 
rouse such royal game, we 
need not go far to find 
their lair. But, while thus 
actually contemplating 
these savage tenants, wan- 



BIBLE PROPHECIES AND CLASSICAL ORACLES. 539 



I will also make it a 
possession for the bittern, 
and pools of water ; and 
I will sweep it with the 
besom of destruction, 
saith the Lord of hosts. 
(Isaiah xiv. 23). 



dering amidst the towers 
of Babylon, and bedding 
themselves within the deep 
cavities of her once mag- 
nificent temple, I could 
not help reflecting on how 
faithfully the various pro- 
phecies had been fulfilled." 
(Sir R. K. Porter). 

"The tower is still to be 
seen and is half a league 
in diameter, but is so ruin- 
ous, so low, and so full of 
venomous creatures, which 
lodge in holes made by 
them in the rubbish, that 
no one durst approach 
nearer to it than within 
half a league, except dur- 
ing two months in the win- 
ter, when these animals 
never stir out of their 
holes." (Rauwolf). 

"Not only great part of 
this plain is little better 
than a swamp, but large 
deposits of the waters are 
left stagnant in the hol- 
lows between the ruins; 
again verifying the threat 
denounced against it." (Sir 
R. K. Porter). 



540 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Some of the earliest and most minute of the proph- 
ecies are in a course of literal accomplishment even 
at the present day. For example, the remarkable 
predictions of Moses respecting the Jewish nation. 
(Deut. xxviii). 

The predictions respecting the sufferings and death 
of Christ (Isaiah lii. 13-liii. 12); and those of Christ 
respecting the destruction of Jerusalem (Matthew 
xxiv.), are discussed by Dr. Paley with his usual skill 
and irresistible power of demonstration in his Evi- 
dences, (Part ii. chap. 1). 

It would carry me far beyond the limits of the pre- 
sent work to go into an extended statement of the ful- 
fillment of scripture prophecies. Nor is it necessary, 
for my only object in this chapter has been, as stated 
in the outset, by contrasting the Hebrew with the hea- 
then prophets, to show that the former, and they only, 
have just claim to divine inspiration. The specimens 
already given are, I suppose, abundantly sufficient to 
accomplish this purpose. 

The wonderful discoveries of modern times on the 
field of the old Bible narrative, by Layard, Rawlinson 
and others, which so marvellously illustrate and con- 
firm the Bible history and the Bible prophecies, will 
find a more appropriate place in the volume on the 
Old Testament. My object is here to show the supe- 
riority of the Bible prophecies, dark and mystical as 
some suppose them to be, to the best oracles of the 
classical nations. 



CHAPTER FOURTEENTH 



REASONS FOR THEIR EXCLUSION FROM THE SACRED CANON. 

As the volume on the Old Testament will necessarily 
be somewhat larger than the volume on the New, for 
convenience sake I here insert the chapter on the Old 
Testament Apocrypha. It will give a greater com- 
pleteness to the present volume ; and here I wish also 
to introduce the testimony of Church Councils. I have 
generally avoided citing such testimony on the 
New Testament ; I wished to show that we can fully 
make out our case for the New Testament books with- 
out mentioning church councils or alluding to them at 
all. Their testimony is important, abundant and 
conclusive, but we do not depend upon it exclusively, 
as is often ignorantly affirmed ; we can even dispense 
with it entirely if we choose. 

I. THE APOCRYPHAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

The books pertaining to the Old Testament which 
the Romish church holds to be sacred and canonical, 
in addition to the original Hebrew canon, are the fol- 
lowing: Tobit, Judith, Wisdom, Sirach, Baruch, Mac- 
cabees I and II , additions to Daniel, additions to Esther. 



542 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Besides these, there are generally printed, as an ap- 
pendix to the Vulgate, the Prayer of Manasseh, and 
Esdras III. and IV. In the English Apocrypha these 
two books of Esdras are designated as I. and II. The 
reason of the Vulgate numeration is, that the canoni- 
cal Ezra is in that translation called Esdras I., and 
the canonical Nehemiah, Esdras II. In this it differs 
from the Septuagint, which retains for Nehemiah the 
Hebrew canonical name. 

Before the time of the council of Trent, the books 
above mentioned had not been received as canonical 
by the Christian churches; most of them had been 
positively and very pointedly condemned by some one 
or more of the eminent church fathers ; those who had 
received them to be read in churches made a marked 
distinction between them and the books of the original 
Hebrew canon, assigning to them a much lower place : 
and they who called any of them canonical, generally 
assigned the most trivial and unsatisfactory reasons for 
so doing. For example, Hilary (Proleg. in Psalm.) 
mentions that the Hebrews had twenty-two canonical- 
books of the Old Testament corresponding to the 
twenty-two letters of the Hebrew alphabet; but as 
the Greeks have twenty-four letters in their alphabet, 
they ought to have twenty-four books in their Old 
Testament canon ; and he, therefore, in order to make 
out the number twenty-four, would add to the Hebrew 
canon the books of Tobit and Judith, for the Greek 
Bible. According to this principle, the Old Testament 
for the Arabs, Ethiopians, Cherokees, and many other 
nations, ought to be enlarged by a number of books 
greater than all the apocryphal writings, numerous as 



APOCRYPHAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TEST. 543 

they are, would be able to supply. Augustin, though 
the greatest man of his time intellectually, was a very 
poor critical scholar. He was disposed to receive all 
the books usually included in the Septuagint as canon- 
ical, because he ignorantly supposed that the Septua- 
gint as a whole had the sanction of the apostles, (quae 
etiam ah Apostolis approbata, which also was approved 
by the apostles.) Epist. 32. ad Hieron. n. 35. Yet, 
though he called all the Septuagint books canon- 
ical, he made a marked distinction among them in 
respect to their authority. He says: In canonicis 
Scripturis ecclesiarum catholicarum quamplurium auc 
toritatem sequatur, ut eas, quae ah omnibus accipiuntur 
ecclesiis catlwlicis, praeponat eas, quas quaedam non 
accipiunt In eis vero, quae non accipiuntur ab omni- 
bus, praeponat eas, quae plures gravioresque accipiunt 
(In the canonical Scriptures he follows for the most 
part the authority of the Catholic churches, so that 
those which are received by all the Catholic churches 
he places before those which some do not receive. 
But in reference to those which are not received by 
all, he prefers those which the greater number 
and the more important churches receive.) Doctr. 
Christ, ii. 3. Here is license enough for the most lib- 
eral Protestant ; and it is by such statements as these 
that Jahn and other enlightened Roman Catholic schol- 
ars endeavored to vindicate the Council of Trent for 
their decree respecting the canon, on the ground that 
there was an understood and admitted distinction 
among the sacred books between the deutero-canonical 
and the proto-canonical. If Augustin and some other 
fathers made such a distinction, it is clear enough that 



the Council of Trent did not. 



544 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Jerome was greatly superior to Augustin in scholar- 
ship, so far as a critical knowledge of languages and 
books is concerned, though greatly inferior in almost 
all other respects. Jerome knew that the apocryphal 
books had no claim to canonical authority, and he said 
so very plainly, and when exasperated by opposition, 
very bitterly. He in one place declares : Sapientia, 
quae vulgo Salomonis inscribitur, et Jesu Sirach liher, 
et Judith, et Tobias et Pastor non sunt in canone. (Wis- 
dom which is commonly inscribed Solomon's, the book 
of Jesus Sirach, and Judith, and Tobias and Pastor are 
not in the canon.) In another place he says of these 
books very sharply : Apocryjphorum naenias morhtis, 
magis haereticis quam ecclesiasticis vivis canendas. (The 
songs of the Apocrypha ought to be sung by dead 
heretics rather than by living ecclesiastics.) Proleg. 
Gal. et Prol. in Com. Matt. Augustin was at vari- 
ance with Jerome, as the theologian is apt to be at 
variance with the scholar. He strongly condemned 
Jerome's Latin translation of the Old Testament, be- 
cause it varied so much from the Septuagint ; though 
it departed from the Septuagint only by coming nearer 
to the divine original in the Hebrew ; but Augustin 
was not scholar enough to know or appreciate a fact 
of this kind. (Compare Marheinecke's Symbolik, 
Band ii. S. 224, ff. first edition, 1810.) 

This is a subject of deep interest at the present time. 
Romanists among us are continually objecting to our 
Bible, calling it a mutilated Bible, and furiously resist- 
ing, wherever they can, its introduction into schools 
and families. In the following pages, we shall give a 
review of the debates and decisions on this subject in 



APOCRYPHAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. 545 

the Council of Trent, that the reader may see on what 
very shallow and insufficient grounds that decision was 
made on which so much was depending ; and then we 
shall show the grounds on which we pronounce that 
decision to be totally wrong, by exhibiting in full the 
reasons why the books in question ought to be ex- 
cluded from the canon of Scripture. The following 
is a summary of the points which will be stated and 
proved in the ensuing discussion : 

(1.) These books never had the sanction of Christ 
or his apostles, or any of the writers of the New 
Testament. 

(2.) They formed no part of the original Hebrew 
canon, and were not written till after the Old Testament 
inspiration had ceased and the canon was closed. 

(3.) They were rejected with singular unanimity 
by the early Christian churches and by the best of the 
church fathers. 

(4.) The books themselves, examined individually, 
can be proved, each one by itself; to be unworthy of 
a place in the canon of Scripture. 

Under this last head we shall give, in regard to each 
book : (a) a description of the book ; (b) we shall 
examine its internal evidence in regard to its having 
a place in the canon, and (c) state the external testi- 
mony in respect to it. 

n. DEBATES AND DECISIONS IN THE COUNCIL OF TRENT. 

The Council of Trent for its fourth session, which 
was held in the spring of the year 1546, collected sev- 
eral propositions respecting the Scriptures from the 
writings of Luther, which they alleged to be erroneous. 
35 



546 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

These propositions were earnestly discussed in the 
several congregations which preceded the session ; as 
was also the question, whether canons with anathemas 
annexed, in the usual manner, should be issued against 
these errors. Two of the alleged errors were these : 
(a) That no books ought to be received into the canon 
of the Old Testament except those which were found 
in the original Hebrew canon, and (b) That the orig- 
inal text, the Hebrew for the Old Testament and the 
Greek for the New, is the only ultimate appeal as the 
pure word of God, and that the Latin Yulgate, used in 
the churches, abounds in erroneous translations. We 
give not the words but only the substance, because it 
is only with these two points that we are concerned in 
the present discussion ; and it would lead us too far 
out of our track to follow the exact order and method 
of the treatment of the several topics in the council. 

We propose to give, and that too in a very con- 
densed form, only what pertains to the Old Testament 
canon, and the authority of the Latin Yulgate as com- 
pared with the original Text. 

In regard to the canon, they were generally agreed, 
that a catalogue of the sacred books should be made 
out, after the example of the ancients ; and that all the 
books usually read in the Roman churches should be 
admitted into it, and that the Old Testament canon 
should not be limited to those books only which were 
received by the Hebrews. The catalogues of the Coun- 
cil of Laodicea, of Pope Innocent L, of the third Coun- 
cil of Carthage, and of Pope Gelasius, were proposed 
as models. As to the form of the catalogue there 
were four opinions : (1.) Some proposed that the books 



APOCRYPHAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TEST. 547 

should be separated into two divisions, the first of which 
should consist of those only which had always and 
without dispute been regarded as canonical, the 
6ftoXoyov/jimp of Eusebius ; and the second, of those 
which had been by some rejected, and in regard to 
which there was more or less of doubt, the foTiUyonhuv. 
(Compare Euseb. Hist. Eccl. iii. 25.) They argued 
that, though this distinction had not been formally and 
expressly recognized by any pope or council, yet it 
had been in fact tacitly and universally acknowledged ; 
that Augustin makes this distinction, and that it is re- 
ceived, and the authority of Augustin in respect to it 
confirmed, by the canon in canonicis. Gregory, also, 
who lived after Gelasius, declares, in his Exposition of 
Job, that the books of Maccabees were written for edi- 
fication and adapted to it, but yet they were not ca- 
nonical. 

Aloysius of Catanea, a Dominican Friar, affirmed 
that this distinction was made by Jerome, and that the 
church had accepted it as the rule and standard for 
establishing the canon of the Holy Scriptures. He 
also quoted Cardinal Cajetan, who, following Jerome, 
had made the same distinction, and in the dedication 
to Clement VII. of his treatise on the historical books 
of the Old Testament, had declared it to be a settled 
principle of the church. 

(2.) A second proposition was, that the books should 
be arranged, not in two, but three divisions, the first 
to consist of those which had always and without con- 
tradiction been received as divine ; the second, those 
which had sometimes been doubted, but whose canon- 
ical authority had at length been confirmed by the 



548 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

usage of the church, to which class belong certain 
epistles and the apocalypse of the New Testament, 
and some few passages in the evangelists; and the 
third division should consist of those books which had 
never been esteemed canonical, to which class belong 
the seven apocryphal books of the Old Testament, and 
the passages of Daniel and Esther ivhich are not found 
in the Hebrew text 

(3.) The third opinion was that there should be no 
distinction made among the books, but after the ex- 
ample of the Council of Carthage and other synods, 
they should merely make out the catalogue and offer 
no remarks upon it. 

(4.) The fourth proposal was this : that all the books 
in all their parts, just as they stand in the Latin Bible, 
should be declared equally of divine authority. The 
book of Baruch here made no little difficulty, for this 
book was not to be found in the catalogues of the 
Laodicean or the Carthaginian councils, nor yet in 
those made by the Roman pontiffs ; and therefore it 
ought to be excluded, both for this reason and because 
the beginning of the book is wanting. Yet, because 
some lessons in the church books were taken from it, 
the members of the council could not be persuaded to 
relinquish its canonical authority ; and they therefore 
resolved that it must have been regarded by the an- 
cients as a part of the book of Jeremiah, and received 
into the canon under the name of that prophet. Thus 
their opinion of what the fact ought to have been, de- 
termined them to assume the fact itself, without evi- 
dence. A summary and convenient mode of proceed- 
ing, which has often been followed, both in ecclesiasti- 
cal and other assemblies. 



APOCRYPHAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TEST. 549 

On the eighth of March, 1546, there was held an 
extraordinary congregation, in which it was unani- 
mously resolved, that church tradition should be held 
of equal authority with the written word of God. 
With respect to the form in which they should put 
forth their catalogue of the canonical Scriptures, the 
theologians still entertained various opinions. One 
was, that the individual books need not be mentioned 
by name ; another, that the books ought to be divided 
into three classes ; and a third, that all the books of 
the Latin Bible should be placed in one rank as of 
equal authority. In this diversity of opinions it was 
agreed, that catalogues should be made out according 
to the three different proposals, and laid before the 
next congregation for examination ; and then it should 
be decided which of the three should be adopted. 

In the congregation of the fifteenth of March, 
the three catalogues were actually presented; each 
had its advocates ; but the third was the one which 
triumphed. In the subsequent congregations, the au- 
thority of the Latin translation was discussed; and 
here arose a hot conflict between the few who had 
some knowledge of the Greek language and a good 
understanding of the Latin, and the many who knew 
nothing of the one and but little of the other. The 
Dominican Aloysius of Catanea here again made him- 
self heard. He remarked, that in regard to this mat- 
ter, nothing could be better in itself or more wisely 
adapted to the times than the principle asserted by 
Cardinal Cajetan, that justly celebrated divine, who 
from his early youth had devoted himself- to the study 
of theology, and with a happy talent and unwearied 



550 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

diligence, which had made him the most distinguished 
in this branch of science of any one for many centu- 
ries ; insomuch that there was not a prelate or doctor 
in the whole council who need be ashamed to confess 
himself his inferior and pupil in point of learning. 
This great prelate, when he went to Germany in 1523, 
to hold his conference with Luther, being led to study 
earnestly the best means of reuniting the dismembered 
church and bringing the heretics to a confession of 
their errors, concluded that the only eifective method 
must be a critical understanding of the Holy Scrip- 
tures in their original languages. Accordingly, dur- 
ing all the rest of his life, full eleven years, he devoted 
himself entirely to the study of the Scriptures, and 
wrote his expositions upon them, not according to the 
Latin translation, but according to the original text, 
the Hebrew for the Old Testament, and the Greek for 
the New ; and, forasmuch as he was not himself skilled 
in these tongues, he employed men thoroughly ac- 
quainted with them to translate for him literally, word 
for word, as is abundantly manifest from his works on 
the sacred books. This excellent cardinal was wont 
to say, that to understand the Latin text was not nec- 
essary to understand the word of God ; the word of 
God is infallible, but the Latin traslators may have 
made mistakes. On this account, also, Jerome justly 
said, that to prophesy and write holy books is the gift 
of God's Spirit ; but to translate these books from one 
language to another is matter of human skill. In 
reference to these words, Cajetan often said with a 
sigh ; u Oh that the teachers of former times had been 
of this opinion, and then the Lutheran heresy would 



APOCRYPHAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT 551 

not have arisen." Cataneus further declared, that the 
Latin translation could not be received as authoritative 
without violating the canon Ut Veterum, etc., dist 9, 
where it is asserted that the truth of the Old Testa- 
ment is to be sought in the Hebrew text, and that of 
the New in the Greek. To declare the one translation 
authentic, would be to condemn Jerome and all the 
others ; for as these cannot be authentic, no further 
use can be made of them. A miserable business it 
would be, in a conflict with opponents, to select a text 
doubtful and not generally acknowledged, when one 
is in possession of the genuine and infallible text, 
which ensures a certain victory. With Jerome and 
Cajetan we must consider it certain that there is no 
translator, whatever care he may exercise, who may 
not sometimes fall into a mistake. If the holy council 
itself would undertake a translation, and examine and 
improve it by the original text, then it might not 
be doubted that the Holy Spirit, which guides all 
church councils in matters of faith, would so aid the 
fathers of the synod, that no error would be commit- 
ted. A translation examined and established in this 
manner might safely be deemed authentic ; but with- 
out such an investigation the synod ought not to ven- 
ture to approve a translation or assure itself of the aid 
of the Holy Ghost. In the council of the apostles 
themselves there was a thorough investigation of the 
matters before them previous to a decision. But as 
such an investigation in this matter would require a 
ten years' labor, he thought it best that the affair 
should be left as it ha.d been for fifteen hundred years 
past. 



552 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

The greater part of the theologians were opposed 
to these views. They argued that the translation which 
had so long been received and used in the churches 
and the schools, must of necessity be declared authen- 
tic ; otherwise, the Lutherans had already gained their 
point and the door was thrown open to endless here- 
sies and unappeasable disturbances. The popes and 
the scholastic theologians had for the most part found- 
ed the doctrines of the Romish church, which was the 
mother of all churches, on certain passages of Scrip- 
ture ; and now, if there were granted to every one the 
right to call in question the translation, whether it 
were correct or not, whether this were done by com- 
paring it with other translations or with the original 
Hebrew and Greek text, then the linguists and gram- 
marians might bring all into confusion and set up them- 
selves as umpires in matters of faith ; and they would 
be the doctors of theology and of the canon law, and 
they would have the dignity of bishops and cardinals ; 
and the inquisitors, if they were not skilled in Hebrew 
and Greek, could no more proceed against the Luther- 
ans, but they would cry out, "it is not so in the origi- 
nal," u the translation is false," and in this manner 
every school-fox may put forth his novelties and the 
abortions of his own brain, conceived in wickedness 
or ignorance, as the true doctrines, and never be at a 
loss, by some grammatical trick, to find a text to justi- 
fy them ; and thus there would never be an end. Every 
body knows that Luther's translation of the Bible has 
brought after it numberless and contradictory heresies, 
worthy of being condemned to eternal darkness ; and 
that Luther himself is continually changing his own 



APOCRYPHAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. 553 

translation, and never publishes a new edition without 
altering at least a hundred passages. Were such liber- 
ty allowed to all who might choose to make use of it 
the time would soon come when a Christian would no 
longer know what to believe. 

These views were by the majority received with ap- 
probation, and it was furthermore argued that God had 
given to the Hebrew church an authentic Scripture, 
and to the Greek an authentic New Testament ; and 
who could affirm, without ofTence, that the Roman 
church, more beloved of God than all the rest, should 
be left without so great a benefaction ? Surely there 
could be no doubt that the same Holy Ghost which 
first gave these holy books, had also directed to the 
translation received by the Roman church. 

To others it seemed going too far to consider a man 
a prophet and apostle because he was the translator of 
a book ; and they modified their idea by saying that 
the translators had not the prophetic and apostolic 
spirit, but doubtless one very nearly related to it. And 
should any one hesitate to attribute to them the influ- 
ences of the Holy Spirit, he must at least allow these 
influences to the council; and if, therefore, the council 
should confirm the Yulgate and pronounce an anathema 
against those who dared question its authority, then 
it must be received as infallible, if not through the 
Spirit which guided the translation, yet at least by 
the Spirit given to the council which had declared it 
authentic. 

Isidor Clarus, a Benedictine abbot, and a scholar 
well-read in these studies, ventured, in the way of a 
historical review, to controvert these opinions, and 



554 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

said, that in the most ancient church there were sev- 
eral Greek translations of the Old Testament, which 
were collected by Origen into one book and arranged 
side by side in six columns. The principal of these 
was the Septuagint, from which many Latin transla- 
tions had been made ; and the New Testament also 
had been many times translated from the Greek into 
the Latin. Of these translations of the Old and New 
Testament, the so-called Itala found the most favor ; 
and this was generally read in the churches, and was 
preferred to all the others by Augustin ; still it was 
always held subordinate to the Greek text. When 
that great linguist, Jerome, became aware that the 
version of the Old Testament, partly through the fault 
of the Greek translators, and partly through that of 
the Latin, was in many places defective, he resolved 
to make a new translation immediately from the He- 
brew, and to improve the version of the New Testa- 
ment by a careful collation of the original Greek. The 
celebrity of his name induced many to receive his 
translations, but many rejected them, partly from at- 
tachment to the old and suspicion of the new, and 
partly, as Jerome himself affirms, out of envy. But 
after time had abated the bitterness of the envy, the 
translations of Jerome were received by the Latins 
very generally, and were used together with the Itala, 
the latter being designated as the old, the former as 
the neiv. Gregory gives testimony to this effect, for 
in his work on Job he writes to Leander, that the 
apostolic See received both translations, that in his 
exposition of Job he had used the new because it 
came nearest to the Hebrew text, yet in his citations 



APOCRYPHAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. 555 

he had sometimes used the one and sometimes the 
other, just as was most convenient for the purpose in 
hand. Thus theologians wavering between the two, 
and using sometimes one and then the other, accord- 
ing to circumstances, they at length combined both 
into one and gave to this the name of Yulgate. The 
Psalms, continued Clarus, were retained entire in the 
old translation, because they, being daily sung in the 
churches, could not well be altered. The minor pro- 
phets were all in the new translation ; the major pro- 
phets were in a translation made up of the two. No 
one can doubt that all this was done in accordance 
with the Divine will, without which nothing can take 
place ; yet no one can say that the human will was 
not equally concerned in it. Jerome himself had free- 
ly taught that no translator is inspired by the Holy 
Spirit; and since the Latin Bible which we use is 
mostly in the translation of Jerome, it seems extrava- 
gant to attribute to him the special inspiration of the 
Holy Ghost, when he himself expressly disclaims it. 
No translation, therefore, ought to be esteemed of 
equal authority with the original text. For these rea- 
sons, therefore, he would advise that the Yulgate 
should have the preference over all other editions; 
that it should be revised and corrected by the original 
text, and then declared to be authentic. If this were 
done, the other old translations would speedily go out 
of use, and new ones might be prohibited by a severe 
edict. Thus all the evils which arise from new trans- 
lations, and which had been so ably set forth in the 
preceding congregations, would in a short time pass 
away. 



556 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

Andrew de Vega, a Franciscan friar, would mediate 
between the two extremes. He would allow, with 
Jerome, that the translator has no prophetic inspiration, 
nor any gift of the Spirit which renders him infallible ; 
and he would allow, with Jerome and Augustin, that 
the translations should be examined and corrected by 
the original text ; yet he would add, that these admis- 
sions and views need not hinder the church from de- 
claring the Yulgate to be authentic. Such a declara- 
tion would imply only that the translation contains no 
material error in respect to faith and practice, but not, 
that, in all its expressions and in every shade of mean- 
ing, it is equal to the original. No translation can 
reach to such a degree of accuracy, but must some- 
times enlarge and sometimes limit the signification of 
particular words, and must sometimes avail itself of 
metaphors and other figures of speech not identical 
with those in the original. The Yulgate had been in 
use in the church for a thousand years and upwards, 
and in this time they had become certain that it con- 
tains no material error in respect to faith or practice. 
The ancient councils had recognized this translation as 
a sufficient one, and it ought now to be valued accord- 
ing to its worth thus indicated ; and it ought to be 
declared authentic in this sense, that every one might 
rely on its correctness without hazarding his salvation. 
Learned men ought not to be withheld, by any prohi- 
bition, from applying themselves to the study of the 
Hebrew and Greek text ; but the new and faulty trans- 
lations, which bring confusion into the church, ought 
to be restrained. 

The many difficulties urged did not hinder the 



APOCRYPHAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. 557 

fathers from declaring, by almost general consent, the 
Vulgate translation to be the authentic Bible of the 
church. Some were so moved by the arguments of 
the theologians, that they wished the subject might be 
passed over for the present ; but the majority were 
against it. Still, the proposal was made, and it was at 
length resolved, that the Vulgate, now declared to be 
authentic, should be carefully examined and corrected, 
and a copy made out according to which all others 
should be printed. Six men were selected for this 
labor, and they were required to engage in it with all 
diligence that the work might be published before the 
close of the council. They reserved to themselves the 
power of adding to this committee, if, in the course 
of their sessions, men should be found suited to such 
an undertaking. 

Thus the Vulgate was received as the authentic text, 
and the apocryphal books of the Old Testament, be- 
ing* a part of it, were received with it as canonical, 
not because there was any argument in favor of the 
infallibility of the text or any proof of the canonical 
authority of these books, for all the argument and all 
the proof was directly the other way ; but simply be- 
cause the state of things was such, that to seem to 
question the entire accuracy of the text or the canon 
of the Vulgate, would occasion great inconvenience 
and trouble to the dominant party in the Romish 
church, and put them at a great disadvantage in their 
controversy with the Protestants. Grammarians and 
linguists must not presume to know more than bishops 
and cardinals; well-settled ecclesiastics must not be 
put to the trouble of learning Hebrew and Greek ; the 



558 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

church of the past must not in any respect be put in 
the wrong, nor must the common people be allowed 
to lessen their confidence in the teachers set over them 
in regular succession from the apostles. Whatever 
might be required by truth and Christian integrity, 
these things were by no means to be allowed. 

There were strong men in that council, well-read 
and intelligent men, who saw the thing as it was, and 
labored to set it right; but their voice was lost in the 
clamor of the multitude, and truth and right availed 
little against the pressure of an immediate and urgent 
self interest. We are sorry to say, that the Council of 
Trent is not the only deliberative body which has been 
swayed in a similar manner ; but that there have been 
abundant examples of the same kind from that day to 
this, both in ecclesiastical and political assemblies, and 
among Protestants as well as Catholics. 

In regard to the sense of Scripture, the well-known 
views of Cardinal Cajetan occasioned no little discus- 
sion. This prelate had taught, both by precept and 
example, that a new interpretation of any passage, if 
it be in accordance with the text and not opposed to 
other Scriptures, may be received, although the major- 
ity of the doctors are against it ; for God did not grant 
the knowledge of Scripture to the ancients alone, oth- 
erwise there would be nothing left for posterity or the 
present generation to do but just to copy the fathers. 
Some strongly advocated these sentiments of Cajetan 
and others opposed them ; and, after a warm discus- 
sion on both sides, Cardinal Pacheco arose and said, 
that the Holy Scriptures had already been so well ex- 
plained by so many pious and learned men, that there 



APOCRYPHAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TEST. 559 

was nothing to be added, and that the new interpreta- 
tions which, from time to time, were brought forward, 
could give rise only to heresies. He considered it nec- 
essary to bridle the insolence of the present age, and 
hold it in subjection to the fathers and the church ; and, 
if a too bold spirit arise, it must be checked and not 
allowed to gratify itself and disturb the world by its 
new revelations. This declaration was vastly pleasing 
to almost the entire assembly. It is such an easy way 
of getting rid of difficulty and establishing the truth, 
that conservative majorities in all generations have 
been very apt to adopt it. 

In the congregation on the twenty-ninth of March, 
the wording of the decree respecting the Scriptures 
came up for discussion. To many it seemed rather 
hard to thunder an anathema against a man, and curse 
him as a heretic, merely because he could not receive 
every unimportant passage of the Yulgate as authen- 
tic, and had some new view of the interpretation of a 
text or two of the Holy Scripture. After long discus- 
sion they concluded to make out the catalogue of the 
sacred books, including the Old Testament Apocrypha, 
and fortify that with an anathema, as also the authority 
of church traditions ; and then, as to translations and 
interpretations, they would so frame the decree as to 
make it a remedy against novelties and impertinent 
expositions. Thus all the learned men of the Roman 
Catholic church in all time were shut up to a reception 
of the apocryphal books as authentic and canonical, 
however clearly their investigations might teach them 
the contrary, and though they knew that these books 
had been expressly rejected by almost all the saints 



560 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

and fathers of the church, who must therefore be re- 
garded as openly anathematized by the council. The 
attempt of Jahn, and some other learned Catholics, to 
escape by classing the books as proto and deutero-ca- 
nontcal, is wholly unsuccessful ; for, though this dis- 
tinction was proposed in the council, it was trium- 
phantly overborne by an almost unanimous vote, and 
all the books included in the Vulgate were placed on a 
footing of entire equality. 

At the close of the congregation, Cardinal Montanus 
eulogized in high terms the wisdom and learning of 
the members, and earnestly exhorted them to an or- 
derly and seemly behavior in the public session, and 
to avoid there all opposition and disputation, inasmuch 
as the points of difference had all been sufficiently 
discussed in the several congregations; and it was 
proper that the public decision should be characterized 
by harmony and unanimity. After they were dismissed, 
Cardinal Cervinus privately called together those who 
had opposed the reception of the Vulgate and its apoc- 
ryphal additions to the original canon, as authentic and 
canonical, and endeavored to pacify them by urging 
that it was not prohibited but allowed to correct the 
Vulgate by the original text, that they were only to 
allege that there were in it no errors of faith so great 
that it ought to be rejected. 

On the eighth of April the public session was held, 
and the decrees were read in due form. The catalogue 
includes the whole of the Old Testament Apocrypha, 
and the decree declares that the synod receives all the 
books enumerated, with the same affection and rever- 
ence, and then proceeds in the following terms: u But 



APOCRYPHAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TEST. 561 

if any one shall not receive these same books entire 
with all their parts, as they are wont to be read in the 
Catholic church, and the old Latin Yulgate edition, for 
sacred and canonical, and shall knowingly and inten 
tionally despise the traditions aforesaid, let him be 
accursed." 

This surely is sufficiently explicit ; and by this de- 
cree the council anathematizes the great body of the 
saints and fathers of the church, as we shall soon see. 
The next decree is without the anathema, and the first 
paragraph is in the following terms: "Moreover, the 
same holy synod decrees and declares, that this same 
old Yulgate edition, which has stood the test of so 
many ages' use in the church, in public readings, dis- 
putings, preachings and expoundings, be deemed au- 
thentic, and that no one on any pretext dare or pre- 
sume to reject it." 

Notwithstanding the strenuous opposition to the sen- 
timent of these decrees while under discussion in the 
congregation, when they were put to vote in the pub- 
lic session, but two voices were heard in opposition or 
remonstrance. The poor little troublesome bishop of 
Chiozza alone ventured to say no, but prudently added, 
perhaps I shall submit (non placet, sedforsan obediam). 
One other member did not approve that traditions 
should be received pari pietatis affectu ac reverentia 
(with equal affection and reverence), but for pari he 
would substitute summa (for equal he would substitute 
greatest) All the others gave an unqualified affirma- 
tive. 

When these proceedings of the council were made 
public, there were many, especially in Germany, who 
36 



562 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

expressed themselves very freely in regard to them. 
Some said it was strange that five cardinals and forty- 
eight bishops should take it upon themselves to decide 
so peremptorily in regard to points of religion of so 
much weight, and which had hitherto remained unde- 
cided, declaring books to be canonical which had thus 
far been regardc as apocryphal, or at most uncertain, 
making a translation authentic which in numerous pas- 
sages departs widely from the original text, and deci- 
ding in :iov- limited or how extended a sense men 
should understand the word of God. Moreover, among 
all these fathers there were none any way distinguish- 
ed for learning ; there were some good canon lawyers, 
but they had no extensive knowledge of religious 
matters ; the few theologians there were below medi- 
ocrity ; the assembly was principally made up of mere 
noblemen and courtiers ; the greater part of the bish- 
ops had no actual sees, and those who were really 
bishops had such small dioceses, that all together they 
could not be considered as representing even the thou- 
sandth part of Christendom. From all Germany there 
was not at this time a single bishop or theologian pres- 
ent in the council. 

Others said that the points decided were after all 
of no such great importance as they appeared to be. 
As to traditions, the decree was a mere bag of wind ; 
for to what purpose was it to ordain that the church 
should receive the traditions, and yet not decide which 
were the true traditions that must be received ? More- 
over, it was not even commanded that they should be 
received ; it was only forbidden that they should know- 
ingly and consciously be despised ; so that one might 



APOCRYPHAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TEST. 563 

even reject them without violating the decree, pro- 
vided he did it respectfully and reverently. The Pa- 
pal court itself sets the example of such rejection ; for 
it prohibits the ordination of deaconesses ; it allows 
the people no vote in the choice of their pastors, when 
this was plainly an apostolic institution and observed 
in the church for more than eight hundred years ; it 
obstinately withholds the cup from the laity, when 
Christ instituted the sacrament in both kinds, and it 
was so received by the apostles, and has been so ob- 
served by the whole church till within about two hun- 
dred years, and even now in all Christian churches 
except the Latin. If these be not traditions what 
else deserves the name ? And in respect to the Vul- 
gate, what signifies the affirmation of its authenticity, 
while the different editions vary so much from each 
other, and no one of these is pointed out as the cor- 
rect one ? 

Such were the comments made at the time, and to 
this day they have lost none of their relevancy or sig- 
nificance. The only authority for the reception of the 
apocryphal books into the Old Testament canon is the 
authority of the Council of Trent; and the entire 
worthlessness of that authority the preceding pages 
abundantly show.* 

* The statements in the above exhibition of the debates and decis- 
ions in the Council of Trent, rest on the following authorities : Sarpi's 
Geschichte des Koncil von Trident, uebersetzt von Winterer, Band 
I. S. 290—298. The same translated by Brent, pp. 150—162. 
Mendham's History of the Council of Trent, pp. 48 — 68. Marhei- 
necke's Christliche Symbolik, II. S. 224—261. Perceval's Soman 
Schism, pp. 158—164. 



564 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 



HI. THESE BOOKS NEVER HAD THE SANCTION OF CHRIST OR 
HIS APOSTLES, OR ANY OF THE WRITERS OF THE NEW 
TESTAMENT. 

The New Testament very frequently quotes, and 
much more frequently contains incidental allusions to, 
the Old. The Pentateuch, the prophetic books, the 
Psalms, and other parts of the sacred volume of the 
Hebrews, were continually in the minds of the wri- 
ters, and flowed out in all their sayings and writings, 
as if welling up from the depths of their innermost 
religious consciousness. But in all these quotations 
and allusions, we look in vain for a reference to any 
of the apocryphal books. Though there are many 
places where incidents of the apocryphal writings 
would afford illustrations exceedingly apt and beauti- 
ful, yet no such illustrations are ever found. If the 
writers of the New Testament were acquainted with 
any of these books (and it is scarcely possible to doubt 
that they had seen some of them), most carefully must 
they have abstained from alluding to them in their 
canonical writings. 

They sanctioned the whole Hebrew canon as it ex- 
isted in their time ; but they sanctioned none of 
the apocryphal books, for they never quote them, 
and these books never formed a part of the Hebrew 
canon. We speak of the ancient apocryphal books 
which are printed in the Yulgate Bible, and not of the 
more recent ones, such as the book of Enoch, the As- 
cension of Moses, etc. These, it is true sometimes 
borrow from the New Testament (compare 2 Tim. iii. 
8, Jude ix. 14) ; but the New Testament never from 



APOCRYPHAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TEST. 565 

them, since it is itself more ancient than they are, or 
at least more ancient than the probably interpolated 
passages on which the stress is laid. 

IV. THESE BOOKS FORMED NO PART OF THE ORIGINAL HE- 
BREW CANON, AND WERE NOT WRITTEN TILL AFTER IN- 
SPIRATION HAD CEASED AND THE CANON WAS CLOSED. 

On this point we have the most explicit, the entirely 
disinterested testimony of Josephus, the Jewish histo- 
rian. In his work against Apion (i. 8), he gives an 
account of all the books held sacred by the Hebrews, 
and this testimony is also copied by Eusebius, the cel- 
ebrated Christian historian (Eccl. Hist. iii. 10). This 
passage of Josephus we shall quote in full, as it stands 
in his writings, noting the variations that occur in Eu- 
sebius. 

" We have not innumerable books which contradict 
each other, but only twenty-two, which contain the his- 
tory of all past times, and are justly believed to be 
divine. Eive of these belong to Moses, and contain 
his laws, and the history of the origin of mankind, 
and reach to his death. This is a period of nearly 
three thousand years. From the death of Moses to 
Artaxerxes [Eusebius : to the death of Artaxerxes], 
who, after Xerxes, reigned over the Persians, the 
prophets who lived after Moses wrote down the events 
of their times in thirteen books. The other four books 
contain hymns to God and precepts for men. From 
Artaxerxes to our own times our history has indeed 
been written ; but these writings are not esteemed 
worthy of the same credit as the former, because since 
that time we have no certain succession of prophets. 



666 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

" What trust we put in these our writings is manifest 
by our deeds. Though so long time has elapsed, no 
one has ever dared to add to, or take from them, or 
make any change in them whatever. It is as it were 
inborn with every Jew, from the very first origin of 
the nation, to consider these books as the doctrines of 
God, to stand by them constantly, and if need be, 
cheerfully to die for them. It is no new thing to see 
the captives of our nation, many of them in number 
and at many different times, endure tortures and deaths 
of all kinds in the public theatres, rather than utter a 
word against our laws, or the records which contain 
them." 

Josephus here clearly recognizes the existence of 
the apocryphal books and expressly excludes them 
from the canon ; while he bears open testimony, as of 
a matter well known to all the world, to the extreme 
and scrupulous care with which the Jews preserved 
all their canonical books free from mutilation and ad- 
dition and change of every kind. 

Comparing these explicit statements of Josephus 
with the numerous quotations from the Old Testament 
which he has made in his historical writings, it is quite 
evident that the twenty-two books which he includes in 
the Hebrew canon, and which he affirms were held 
most sacred by the Jews who were contemporary with 
Christ and the apostles, are the following : 

The five books of Moses : 

(1) Genesis. (2) Exodus. (3) Leviticus. 

(4) Numbers. (5) Deuteronomy. 



APOCRYPHAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TEST. 567 

The thirteen prophetic books : 

(1) Joshua. (2) Judges and Ruth. 

(3) 2 Books of Samuel. (4) 2 Books of Kings. 

(5) 2 Books of Chronicles. (6) Ezra and Nehemiah. 

(7) Esther. (8) Isaiah. 

(9) Jeremiah. (10) Ezekiel. 

(11) Daniel. (12) 12 Minor Prophets. 
(13) Job. 

The four Books of hymns and precepts : 

(1) Psalms. (2)Proverbs. 

(3) Ecclesiastes. (4) Canticles. 

This is according to the Jewish arrangement and 
nomenclature of the books, which, in many respects, 
differs from that which has been received into our 
English Bibles from the Greek translation of the Sev- 
enty.* 

V. THESE BOOKS WERE REJECTED WITH SINGULAR UNANIM- 
ITY BY THE EARLY CHRISTIAN CHURCHES AND THE BEST 
OF THE CHURCH FATHERS. 

(1) Testimony of Melito, Bishop of Sardis, A. D. 170, 
who rejects them all. 

Melito was, after the apostles, one of the earliest 
bishops of the apocalyptic church of Sardis, a distin- 
guished writer, and of great influence among the early 
Christians. He travelled to Palestine for the express 
purpose of ascertaining exactly the canon of the Old 
Testament, and gave the result of his investigations in 
the following letter to his friend Onesimus, which we 
find in Eusebius (Eccl. Hist. B. iv. 26) 

* Compare Eichhorn's Einleit. ins Alt. Test. B. I. S. 143—163. 



568 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

" Melito to Onesimus his brother, greeting : Since 
you have often, on account of your zeal for the word 
of God, begged of me to make selections for you, from 
the law and the prophets, concerning the Saviour and 
our whole faith ; and as you, moreover, wished to learn 
accurately of the old books, how many they are in 
number and in what order they are written, I have 
earnestly endeavored to perform the same, well know- 
ing your zeal for the faith and your great desire to 
learn the word of God ; and that, through your earnest 
love toward God, you desire these more than all things 
else, striving for your eternal salvation. 

" I accordingly went to the East, and, coming to the 
very place where these things were preached and 
transacted, I have accurately learned the books of the 
Old Testament. Their names are as follows : five 
books of Moses, to wit, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, 
Numbers, Deuteronomy. Joshua Nave, Judges, Ruth, 
Four books of Kings [two of Samuel and two of 
Kings], two of Paralipomenon [Chronicles]. The 
Psalms of David, the Proverbs of Solomon (which is 
also Wisdom), Ecclesiastes, the Song of Songs, Job. 
Of the prophets, Isaiah, Jeremiah ; and of the twelve 
prophets, one book ; Daniel, Ezekiel, Esdras " [includ- 
ing also Nehemiah, and perhaps Esther]. 

Here this ancient bishop excludes every apocryphal 
book from the canon, though he must have known of 
their existence. From the names which he gives to 
some of the books, it is plain that he read them in the 
Septuagint translation; yet, though the apocryphal 
books had probably been added to this translation be- 
fore his time, he carefully excludes them all. The 



APOCRYPHAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TEST. 569 

most ancient church fathers were much more discrim- 
inating in their investigation of the sacred books, than 
the comparatively modern fathers in the Council of 
Trent. Melito knew whereof he affirmed, for he had 
examined with the greatest care, at the very source of 
information, and under the pressure of a very strong 
and elevated motive. * 

Melito does not give the name of the book of Esther, 
and in some other of the church fathers this name is 
also omitted. But this does not prove that the book 
of Esther was by them excluded from the canon. Many, 
supposing that book to have been written by Ezra, 
included it under the general name of Esdras. In 
Hebrew the books have no names, but each is desig- 
nated by its initial word. Melito arranges the books 
in the order of time, and the four historical books pre- 
ceding the captivity (two of Samuel and two of Kings) 
he calls by the general name of Kings, and so it is 
possible that he might have designated the three 
historical books -subsequent to the captivity by the 
general name of Esdras, especially as Nehemiah was 
usually included in that designation, and Esther was 
by some supposed to be the work of Ezra.* 

It is possible, also, that Esther by these fathers might 
have been entirely excluded, on account of its being 
so encumbered with apocryphal additions, which they 
might have found it difficult to separate from the gen- 
uine work. 

* Cary's Testimonies of the Fathers, p. 114. Eichhorn's Einleit. 
Alt. Test. i. 166. 



570 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

(2) Testimony of Origen, the great Biblical Scholar of 

the Early Greek Church, A. D. 200, ivho rejects them 

all. 

The testimony of Origen is preserved by Eusebius 
(Eccl. Hist. VI. 25), and is for substance the follow- 
ing : "It should be observed that the collective books, 
as handed down by the Hebrews, are twenty -two, ac- 
cording to the number of letters in their alphabet. 
These twenty-two books, according to the Hebrews, 
are as follows : (1) Genesis ; (2) Exodus ; (3) Leviticus ; 
(4) Numbers; (5) Deuteronomy; (6) Joshua, the son 
of Nave; (7) Judges and Ruth in one; (8) first and 
second of Kings in one (Samuel) ; (9) third and fourth 
of Kings in one; (10) first and second of Chronicles 
(Paralipomenon) in one ; (11) Esdras, first and second 
(i. e. Nehemiah) in one; (12) Book of Psalms; (13) 
Proverbs of Solomon ; (14) Ecclesiastes ; (15) Song 
of Songs; (16) Isaiah; (17) Jeremiah, with Lamen- 
tations and the epistle, in one; (18) Daniel; (19) 
Ezekiel; (20) Job ; (21) Esther." 

It is remarkable that, though Origen twice says the 
Hebrew books are twenty-two, the list which he gives 
contains but twenty-one. On examination, we find 
the book of the twelve minor prophets omitted. This 
added, would make the requisite number of twenty- 
two. That there is here, not a mistake of Origen, but 
an error in the text of Eusebius, is manifest from the 
fact that the Latin translation of Origen by Rufinus 
has this book, as does also Hilary's prologue to the 
Psalms, which includes this passage of Origen.* Ori- 

*Eichhorn's Einleit.ins Alt. Test. I. 169, 170. Perceval's Eoman 
Schism, p. 421. 



APOCRYPHAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. 571 

gen's other writings, also, show his acquaintance with 
these prophets. 

It is, perhaps, not easy to determine what Origen 
intends by the epistle of Jeremiah. Possibly it may 
be the letter contained in the apocryphal book of 
Baruch, chapter vi. That Origen understood the dif- 
ference between the canonical and apocryphal books 
is manifest from what he says in immediate connection 
with his catalogue : " Separate from these (i|w dh roiiwv) 
are the Maccabees," etc. 

(3) Testimony of the Apostolic Canons, about A. D. 
250, which probably reject them all. 

The text here is somewhat uncertain, and has evi- 
dently been tampered with. The copies vary from 
each other. One manuscript includes Judith, and 
some admit Maccabees ; but the oldest and best copies 
exclude all the apocryphal books. The following is 
the catalogue according to the best testimony : 

"Let these be the sacred and holy books for all, 
both clergy and laity, namely, of the Old Testament, 
of Moses five, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, 
Deuteronomy ; of Joshua, the son of Nave, one ; of 
Ruth one ; of Kings four ; of Paralipomenon [Chroni- 
cles], the book of days, two ; of Esdras two [including 
Nehemiah] ; of Esther one ; of Job one ; of the Psal- 
ter one ; of Solomon three, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, 
Song of Songs ; of the twelve prophets one ; of Isaiah 
one ; of Jeremiah one ; of Ezekiel one ; one of Daniel." 
There is then permission given to read the Son of 
Sirach. The book of Judges is omitted, unless it be 
included under the name of Ruth. The text, how- 



572 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

ever, is so imperfect, that we cannot very confidently 
rely upon it. Nevertheless, it shows, decidedly, that 
in the middle of the third century the apocryphal 
books had not yet found their way as canonical into 
the Christian church.* 

(4) Testimony of Athanasius, the great Champion of 
Orthodoxy, A. B. 330, who rejects them all except 
Baruch, 

The testimony of this father may be found in his 
works, Tom. II. p. 39, Paris edition, 1629. It is as 
follows : " The books of the Old Testament are twenty- 
two, which is the number of the letters among the 
Hebrews. Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deu- 
teronomy, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, of Kings four, two 
books ; of Paralipomenon (Chronicles) two, one book ; 
Esdras two, one book ; Psalms, Proverbs ; twelve pro- 
phets, one book ; then Isaiah, Jeremiah with Baruch, 
Lamentations, and epistles ; Ezekiel and Daniel. Then 
there are books uncanonical, but readable, the Wisdom 
of Solomon, Sirach, Esther, Judith, Tobit.'' 

It is very curious that Athanasius should put Esther 
among the uncanonical books, and Baruch in the can- 
onical ; yet so it reads. Esther was encumbered with 
many apocryphal additions, and the epistle ascribed 
to Jeremiah in the book of Baruch was by some re- 
ceived as genuine. This may account for the mistake 
of Athanasius on this point ; and the entire testimony 
of Athanasius clearly shows, that the apocryphal 

*Labbe and Cossart, Concil. I. 44. Perceval's Roman Schism, 
421, 422. 



APOCRYPHAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. 573 

books, as a whole, were decidedly rejected by the 
church in his time. 

There is another passage from Athanasius, very val- 
uable on account of the clear distinction which it makes 
between the canonical and the apocryphal books. It 
is in the Epist. Festal, quoted by Carey (Testimonies 
of the Fathers, p. 117): "Since some persons have 
attempted to set in order the books that are called 
apocryphal, and to mix them with the divinely inspired 
Scriptures, of which we have been fully certified, as 
those who saw them from the beginning, and who, be- 
ing ministers of the word, handed them down from 
our fathers, it seemed fitting to me, being exhorted 
thereto by the orthodox brethren, and having learned 
the truth, to set out in order the canonical Scriptures, 
which have been handed down, and are believed to be 
from God ; that every one who has been deceived, 
may convict those who have led him astray." Here 
follows the list. He adds : "It is true that, besides 
these, there are other books which are not put into the 
canon, but yet are appointed by the fathers to be read 
by those who first come to be instructed in the way 
of piety." He then gives the names of most of the 
common apocryphal books. 

(5) Testimony of Hilary, the celebrated Bishop of 
Poictiers, A. D. 350, who rejects them all. 
Prologue to the Psalms, Sec. 15 : "And this is the 
cause that the law of the Old Testament is arranged 
in twenty -two books, that they may correspond with 
the number of the Hebrew letters. According to the 
traditions of the ancients, they are so arranged that 



574 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

there are five books of Moses ; Joshua Nave, six ; 
Judges and Ruth, seven ; first and second of Kings, 
eight ; third and fourth of Kings, nine ; of Paralipo- 
menon two, ten ; book of days of Esdras, eleven ; 
Solomon's Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs, thir- 
teen, fourteen and fifteen ; twelve prophets, sixteen ; 
then Isaiah, Jeremiah with Lamentations and Epistle, 
these and Daniel and Ezekiel and Job and Esther, make 
up the number of twenty-two books. Some are pleas- 
ed to add Tobit and Judith, to make the number 
twenty-four, according to the letters of the Greek 
alphabet." 

This hint of Hilary's, which has already been refer- 
red to in another part of this discussion, is not an un- 
fair specimen of a very considerable portion of the 
logic which we find among the good old fathers of the 
first four centuries. The Greeks had two more letters 
in their alphabet than the Hebrews had in theirs, and 
therefore it was well that they should have two more 
books in their Old Testament canon, to make all cor- 
respond ; and it is suggested that for this purpose two 
can be taken out of the Apocrypha ! No wonder that 
where such reasoning prevailed, spurious books some- 
times crept in. 

(6) Testimony of Epiphanius, the great opposer of 
Heresy, A. D. 360, who rejects them all. 
u The Hebrews have two and twenty letters, and 
five of these have two forms ; and also their sacred 
books are so disposed that they number twenty-two, 
and yet twenty-seven are found, because five of them 
are divided into two parts. Thus Ruth is joined to 



APOCRYPHAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. 575 

Judges, and both are reckoned as one book by the 
Hebrews; and the first of Paralipomenon is joined to 
the second, and both called one book ; the first of 
Kings is joined to the second, and called one book ; 
the third to the fourth, and so on. Thus the books 
are contained in four Pentateuchs, and two others re- 
main besides ; so that the canonical books are thus : 
five legislative, (1) Genesis, (2) Exodus, (3) Leviticus, 
(4) Numbers, (5) Deuteronomy; and this is the Pen- 
tateuch and the legislation. Then five are poetical, 
(6) the book of Job, (7) the Psalter, (8) Proverbs of 
Solomon, (9) Ecclesiastes, (10) Song of Songs. Then 
another Pentateuch which is called the writings, and 
by some the holy writings, which are as follows: (11) 
book of Joshua, son of Nave, (12) Judges with Ruth, 
(13) first of Paralipomenon with the second, (14) first 
of Kings with the second, (15) third of Kings with 
the fourth, (16) the twelve Prophets, (17) Isaiah, (18) 
Jeremiah, (19) Ezekiel, (20) Daniel ; and this is the 
prophetic Pentateuch. Two others remain, which are, 
one of Esdras and this is also reckoned, and another 
book, which is called that of Esther. Thus the twenty- 
two books are completed, according to the number of 
the Hebrew letters." He then mentions two of the 
apocryphal books, to wit, the Wisdom of Solomon, 
and the book of Jesus Sirach, and says: "these in- 
deed are useful books and profitable, but they are not 
placed in the number of the canonical." De Ponder, 
et Mena II. 16.* 



* Perceval's Rom an Schism, pp. 423, 424. Carey's Testimonies, 
pp. lia— 118. 



576 



THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE 



(7) Testimony of the Council of Laodicea, A. D. 367, 
confirmed hy the Fourth General Council of Chalce- 
don, A. D. 451, which rejects them all. 

The books of the Old Testament which must be 
read are: Genesis of the world, Exodus from Egypt, 
Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua son of Nave, 
Judges, Ruth, Esther, of Kings first and second, third 
and fourth, Paralipomenon first and second, Esdras 
first and second, book of 150 Psalms, Proverbs of Sol- 
omon, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs, Job, twelve Pro- 
phets, Isaiah, Jeremiah [and Baruch],* Lamentations 
and Epistles, Ezekiel, Daniel.'" Labbe and Cossart, 
Concil. I. 1509. 

(8) Testimony of Gregory Nazianzen, the Felloiv-stu- 
clent and distinguished Opponent of the Emperor 
Julian, A. D. 390, who rejects them all. 

Gregory gives a catalogue of the sacred books in 
one of those poetic effusions of his, which were quite 
famous in their day. We will content ourselves with 
simply giving the facts, without attempting to translate 
the poetry. 

"All the historical books are twelve. The first is 
Genesis, then Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and the 
Second Law (Deuteronomy). Then Joshua,, and 
Judges, and Ruth the eighth. The ninth and tenth 
books are the deeds of the Kings, then Paralipomenon, 
and you have Esdras the last. Five are the poetic 

*The book of Baruch is omitted in the best copies; see above, p. 
282, debates in the Council of Trent. 
Vol. XI. No. 42. 



APOCRYPHAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. 577 

books, of which the first is Job, then David, then three 
of Solomon, Ecclesiastes, Song, and Proverbs. Five 
also are those of the prophetic spirit. Twelve [pro- 
phets] indeed are in one writing, Hosea, Amos, and 
Micah the third, then Jonah, Joel and Obadiah, Nahum, 
Habakkuk and Zephaniah, Haggai, then Zachariah and 
Malachi. These make one book. The second is Isaiah, 
then Jeremiah, who was called from the womb, then 
Ezekiel, and the grace of Daniel. He gave two and 
twenty ancient books, corresponding to the letters of 
the Hebrew alphabet." 

He then speaks of other books (joItm Ui6g) "separate 
from these," and (ofa iv yvrjaioig) "not among the gen- 
uine ;" thus showing that he was acquainted with the 
apocryphal books, and intelligently rejected them. 

(9) Testimony of Amphilochius, the celebrated Bishop 
of Iconium, A. D. 390, who rejects them all. 

Amphilochius is the one who invented the argu- 
ment, once so famous, which convinced the Emperor 
Theodosius of the deity of Christ. Going to the em- 
peror to induce him to take some measures against the 
Arians, he purposely omitted showing any respect to. 
his son Arcadius. The emperor manifested indigna- 
tion, and the bishop boldly said : " Sire, are you offend- 
ed that an indignity is offered to your son ? Then be 
assured God must abhor those who treat his Son with 
disrespect." The emperor, of course, after this, was 
very severe on the Arians. 

The catalogue of Amphilochius is also in poetry, 
but it is not necessary for our purpose that we translate 
into verse. 

37 



578 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

"I will speak of the first books of the Old Testa- 
ment. The Pentateuch, the Creation [Genesis], then 
Exodus ; Leviticus is the middle book, after that, 
Numbers, then Deuteronomy. Add to these Joshua 
and Judges ; then Ruth, four books of Kings, and two 
books of Paralipomenon ; and upon these the first of 
Esdras, then the second. I will mention to you in 
order the five poetic books : Job, pressed with con- 
flicts of various sufferings ; the book Psalms, the me- 
lodious cure for souls; three books of Solomon the 
wise, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes and the Song of Songs; 
and to these add the twelve prophets, Hosea first, then 
Amos the second, Micah, Joel, Obadiah, also Jonah, 
the type of his three days' passion, after these Nahum, 
Habakkuk, then the ninth Zephaniah, Haggai and Zac- 
hariah, and the far-famed messenger Malachi. After 
which learn four prophets, Isaiah the great free speak- 
er, Jeremiah the sympathetic and mystic, Ezekiel, and 
Daniel the last, the same most wise in words and deeds. 
To these some also add Esther." Iamb, ad Sel. 

This father, like some others, suggests a doubt as to 
Esther ; but in all other respects his canon is precisely 
like ours, and excludes every one of the apocryphal 
books. 

(10) Testimony of Jerome, the great Biblical Scholar 
of the Latin Church, the Author or Compiler of the 
very Vulgate itself A. D. 400, who clearly and de- 
cidedly rejects them all. 

No one of the fathers had ever studied so thorough- 
ly the literature of the Bible or understood it so well 
.as Jerome. If Origen were his equal or even his su- 



APOCRYPHAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. 579 

perior, in general learning and iron industry, Jerome 
had most decidedly the advantage in sound judgment 
and common-sense principles of interpretation. Jerome 
divides and arranges the books of the Old Testament 
in the following manner : (1 — 5) five books of Moses; 
(6) Joshua; (7) Judges and Ruth; (8) two books of 
Samuel; (9) two books of Kings; (10) Isaiah ; (11) 
Jeremiah's Prophecy and Elegy; (12) Ezekiel; (13) 
twelve minor Prophets; (14) Job; (15) Psalms; (16) 
Proverbs; (17) Ecclesiastes ; (18) Song of Solomon; 
(19) Daniel; (20) two books of Chronicles; (21) two 
books of Ezra, i. e. Ezra and Nehemiah; (22) Esther. 

In his Prologus galeatus to the Yulgate, he makes 
the following statements, which are directly in the 
teeth of the decisions of the Council of Trent in re- 
spect to that very Yulgate. "There are twenty-two 
letters in the Hebrew alphabet . . . and five of these 
letters have two forms, to wit, Caph, Mem, Nun, Pe, 
Tsade. Hence with most, five of the books are divi- 
ded into two, to wit, Samuel, Melachim, Dibre Hajam- 
mim, Esdras, and Jeremiah with Cinoth, that is, La- 
mentations. 

u As there are, therefore, twenty-two elements, by 
which we write in Hebrew all that we speak ... so 
there are reckoned twenty-two volumes. . . . The 
first book among them is called Beresith, which we 
name Genesis, the second Veele Semoth, the third 
Vajicra, that is, Leviticus, the fourth Vajedabber, which 
we call Numbers, the fifth Elle Haddebarim, which is 
styled Deuteronomy. These are the five books of 
Moses, which they appropriately style Thora, that is, 
the Law. 



580 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

" They make a second rank of the Prophets, and 
they begin with Jesus the son of Nave, whom they call 
Josue hen Nun. Then they add Sophetim, that is, the 
book of Judges, in which they include Ruth, because 
her story belongs to the time of the judges. Third 
follows Samuel, which we call the first and second of 
Kings ; the fourth Melachim, that is, Kings, which is 
contained in the third and fourth volume of Kings. 
The fifth is Esaias, the sixth Jeremias, the seventh 
Ezehiel. The eighth is the book of the twelve Pro- 
phets, which among them is called Thereasar. 

u The third rank contains the Hagiographa. The 
first book by Job begins ; the second is by David, the 
volume of Psalms in five divisions. The third is Sol- 
omon, having three books, Proverbs, which they call 
Misle, that is, Parables, the fourth Ecclesiastes, that is, 
Coheleth, the fifth Song of Songs, which they entitle 
Sir Hassirim. The sixth is Daniel, the seventh Dibre 
Hajammim, that is, the Words of Days . . . which 
among us is entitled the first and second of Paralipo- 
menon {Chronicles). The eighth is Esdras, which the 
Greeks and Latins divide into two books [Ezra and 
NehemiaK], the ninth is Esther. 

Thus there are twenty-two books of the Old Law, 
five of Moses, eight of the Prophets, and nine of the 
Hagiographa. Some put Ruth and Cinoth in the Hag- 
iographa . . . , and then the books of the Old Law 
are made twenty-four. 

u This prologue of the Scriptures can serve as a for- 
tified approach to all the books which we translate 
from the Hebrew into Latin ; so that we may know 
that whatever is beyond these must be put in the Apoc- 



APOCRYPHAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. 581 

rypha. Therefore the book of Wisdom, which is com- 
monly entitled the Wisdom of Solomon ; the book of 
Jesus the son of Sirach, Judith, Tobias, and Pastor, 
are not in the canon. I have found the first of Mac- 
cabees in Hebrew ; the second is Greek, as it can be 
proved from its very phraseology." 

Preface to Jeremiah. " We omit the book of 
Baruch . . . which does not exist and is not read 
among the Hebrews." 

Preface to Daniel. This book, " among the He- 
brews has neither the story of Susannah, nor the hymn 
of the three youths, nor the fables of Bel and the 
Dragon." 

Jerome also makes a similar remark in regard to 
the apocryphal additions to the book of Esther. In 
the very text of the Yulgate itself he notes with the 
most scrupulous care every apocryphal addition to the 
sacred text ; and, had the Latin church but heeded 
the teachings of her great master on this subject, her 
Bible would never have been contaminated by its 
spurious excrescences • nor would the fathers of the 
Council of Trent have made a decision alike discred- 
itable to their reputation as scholars and their sincerity 
and integrity as Christian men. 

We will adduce but one other witness. 

(11) Testimony of Rufinus, the learned Translator of 
Origen, A. D. 400, who rejects them all. 
Rumnus was a theological opponent of Jerome, and 
had many a sharp controversy with him in regard to 
Origen; but when he gives a catalogue of the sacred 
books, he agrees ivith Jerome exactly, and then pro- 



582 THE BOOKS OF THE BIBLE. 

ceecls to remark : "These are they which the Fathers 
concluded within the canon; of which they would 
have the assertions of our faith to consist. But we 
must know that there are other books, which are not 
called canonical, but ecclesiastical, by the ancients; 
such as the Wisdom, which is called of Solomon, and 
another Wisdom, which is called of the Son of Sirach ; 
which book among the Latins is called by this general 
term 'Ecclesiasticus,' by which word, not the author 
of the book, but the quality of the writing is desig- 
nated. Of the same order is the little book of Tobit, 
also Judith and the books of Maccabees."* 

From the preceding exhibition it is as plain as day- 
light can make anything plain, that the Romish church, 
in receiving the apocryphal books as a part of Scrip- 
ture, has not only set at nought all historical truth, but 
acted in direct violation of its own fundamental prin- 
ciple. The unanimous consent of the fathers is what 
she requires for the establishment of a doctrine ; but 
on this subject, instead of a unanimous consent, for the 
first four centuries she is met with an all but unanimous 
dissent Her maxim is to receive only quod semper, 
quod ubique, quod ah omnibus, (what always, what 
every where, what by all), is received ; but here she 
obviously receives quod nunquam, quod nullibi, quod 
ah radio, (what never, what nowhere, what by nobody,) 
is received ; and she anathematizes the Protestants and 
spurns their Bible as mutilated because they exclude 
from it those spurious writings which were excluded 
with most remarkable unanimity by the churches and 

* Perceval's Roman Schism, p. 426. Carey's Testimonies of the 
Fathers, p. 119. 



APOCRYPHAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. 583 

the fathers of the first four centuries, including their 
own most boasted saints and their own most celebrated 
churches, the saints of Rome and the very church of 
Rome itself among the rest. The only shadow of a 
discrepancy from the strict Protestant view of the Old 
Testament canon, which we find in any of them, is, 
that, in one or two instances, the book of Baruch seems 
to be included and the book of Esther excluded. Yet 
even these instances, as we have already seen, are far 
from being certain ; as to the great mass of the apocry- 
phal books, the testimony against them for the first 
four centuries is unequivocal, unimpeachable, and per- 
fectly decisive. The decree of the Council of Trent 
on this subject was neither more nor less than a most 
wretched blunder, arising partly from ignorance and 
partly from partisan heat and blindness. A church 
which claims infallibility, can never correct her own 
blunders, but must hold on upon them till they eat the 
very heart out of her, as a man may be destroyed, 
mind and body, by the morbid growth of an ineradi- 
cable wen. 

The fourth point proposed, to wit, the examination 
of the apocryphal books themselves, will afford ample 
material for a separate discussion in the volume on the 
Old Testament 



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